


to you, my seraphim

by wingsofstarlight (CheshireCatLife)



Category: Captain America (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Alternate Universe - Angels, Alternate Universe - College/University, Alternate Universe - Guardian Angels, Angel Steve, Bucky Barnes Needs a Hug, Bucky Barnes's Plums, Guardian Angels, M/M, Modern Bucky Barnes, Morality, Protective Steve Rogers, Shitty Friends, Steve Is a Good Bro, Suicide Attempt, Swearing, Unnecessary amount of profuse swearing
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-10-26
Updated: 2018-12-22
Packaged: 2019-08-07 21:17:44
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 6
Words: 35,389
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16416128
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/CheshireCatLife/pseuds/wingsofstarlight
Summary: A guardian angel: a protector, a fighter, a helper. Steve Rogers likes to believe he's all those things. Bucky, on the other hand, thinks this guy is just alittleintrusive.





	1. Wait

  **STEVE ROGERS - THE ABYSS**

[Black](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lAwYodrBr2Q) swarms his vision and he knows then that he can’t move. He does not know _why_ he can’t move. In fact, he doesn’t think that moving is the problem at all. He cannot see his body, nor can he see anything. It has been this way for a while now - how long, Steve is unsure - but a while, Steve is sure of it.

Steve likes to call this place The Abyss. It sounds nice on his tongue, or what would have been his tongue. He’s sure he doesn’t have one of them either anymore.

I think it is clear now that Steve does not know a lot of things. Although, he is sure of one or two things. He died. Yes, that is a fact. He is sure of that. He remembers dying: in that cheap hospital on the edge of Brooklyn, a crumbling building that had fallen into detriment far before Steve had ever had to go near there.

He definitely remembers dying.

He certainly isn’t sure of much else. A hand on his forehead, a murmured “he’s gone” (he can recall some loose curls, presumably hair, falling around the pretty nurse’s face) and then this black abyss - toiling darkness, the endless black. It’s the Darkness; The Void. Whatever you’d like to call the place you go after you die.

Either way, it’s still rather boring.

Steve does not remember his last name. He hardly remembers his first. He has to make the first ‘s’ sound in his mind before he can even piece the letters together. Steve does not remember his life. Only his death. He hardly knows what death is when the definition of life is so fragile. The darkness does that. When he cannot see or feel or touch or taste or smell, it all seems to become redundant.

He’s floating. He’s happy floating. Although, if asked, he would admit to his disappointment. He’d spent a life, when not in hospital, doing his darn hardest to do well by God. He think he accomplished it. He did not spite people, even in his mind, he helped people, even when he was too weak to really be much use, he smiled, even when there was nothing to smile about, he protected, even when he was not the one strong enough to be protecting. Steve is undoubtedly a good person. Or was. He’s hardly sure whether this is the past or the future or the present - it all feels timeless.

There a few things apart from his death that he can piece together. He is not sure how, but he can. This Abyss, what he’d previously called heaven (or hell), is death. He also knows that time goes slowly here. He’s sure of it. He is not sure how he is sure of it. But he is. (It seems, now, that one of the things Steve is most unsure about is how he is sure about the few things he is). Timeless is a good word to apply but he’s not sure if it's true. Somehow, he also knows that time is passing. Everything’s foggy; he cannot trust his mind to tell the truth. He’d relied on instinct back then. Now he barely even trusts his own silent senses.

One more thing he is sure of, though, the one thing that gives him hope, is that this is not the last place he will be. Somewhere, his body is buried in the ground. Yet he is here. But it is not where he will end. He led a good life - heaven is still there. Because he knows this can’t be heaven; he’s just stuck in Purgatory. He’s not sure how he knows that, he’s not even sure if he believes it, but he is.

Except this isn’t part of God’s will. He knows that too. As a Catholic, he’d always hoped that his days of reckoning would be short and his trip to heaven peaceful. Now he knows that it cannot be. For it is not God who is guiding souls into his arms.

The Force that is his gaoler is ineffable.

He also knows that it is that force that sends the people away who are not like him. Not good. Bad people (yet is sounds so childish to call them that). The Force sends them away. They do not get to stay in the chilling warmth of the Abyss.

There are three type of people in this world, Steve thinks. People like him: truly good (although it seems so arrogant to label himself so), the people - almost all people - who are somewhere in between - they stay in the Abyss; the Abyss is kind to them. It’s kind and it’s fair and it's just. If you live a life of wrong, you go to...nowhere. Just nowhere. No black, no nothing. Black is not nothing. When you close your eyes and see black, you still have the rest. The sound. The feeling. Black means something is still there. Our eyes just aren’t trained to pick up on it. Consciousness is not vision.

Nowhere is exactly what it says it is. Incomprehensible to humans who always think there is something. But no, it’s nothing. It’s the place outside the Universe.

Even if Steve isn’t quite sure how this darkness is part of this Universe either. It certainly doesn’t adhere to the little physics he was taught by the kind, tutoring nurse who took pity on his lack of education, deprived of it due to constant bouts of illnesses.

The simple fact of it all is that he understands very little of it. It does not adhere to laws, or physics, or life, or even his own concept of death. It’s a space in between. A judgment: of guilt? morality? only another thing Steve was not wholly sure about.

It’s only when he starts to believe that his judgment may have already ended - a flicker of doubt in his mind - that the white appears. To him, it only feels like minutes since his death yet he also seems vaguely aware that it has been far longer. The white speck, for all he knows, has been there for a few decades, not a few seconds. Maybe it had always been there.

Once again, Steve is not sure.

He reaches for it. He thinks it’s the only thing he can do in this inky darkness. He is sure that is what most people feel. Then, they have bliss. Then, they don’t have to remember. They can, just as those who are punished can’t. But they are granted freedom from their own thoughts. They are granted peace. They are given the _choice_.

The white speck does not grow but rather twists. Steve does not quite understand it for he can’t see it. That is the worst part of it all. He cannot see it, nor hear it, nor feel it. It makes him fairly sure that this is not happening at all. The experience after death is something that can never be explained because no one comes back from the dead. This might not be death at all.

Is this what a coma feels like?

Steve pushes away the idea. He’d died. He knows he had died. It is the undeniable, reasonable truth. He lives - or dies - in a place now that will never be explained. One where dreams are reality but reality is nonexistent. One where he feels like crying for the stark loneliness of it but knows he can’t. He knows he does not have a body to cry with. He didn’t get to say goodbye to his life, it simply ended. And now he has garnered this, a peacefully excruciating death where he is plagued by languid thoughts. There is not time here; he has either been plagued for a minute or an eternity. He is not sure which one is worse. That in itself makes it so much worse.

For some reason, now is the first time he ever seems to feel these emotions. He may not be able to feel physically but it seems now that his spirit or soul or corporeal existence can finally feel the dreaded emotions of death - he’s finally felt the fear of dying. And for that, he spites the white dot.

The fear, the isolation, the confusion, it all dawns on him in one heady second.

He grasps for the white dot like a ship to a lighthouse, suddenly so scared of his own loneliness that he can’t wait for the next place - he needs it now, he just needs it to _stop_. Reaching out like a person may be on the other side, he is engulfed into the blank whiteness of the place. Like a subtle glow, it unravels him, reveals him. He decides, then and there, to call this place The Glow. It is not for any particular reason, exactly. Well, he is certainly sure that this place does glow in the vague sense of the word. He still cannot see, so to say it really glowed would be impossible. But he felt it, like staring at the sun with your eyes closed - felt the burning behind his phantom eyelids. He’s a man that has not just lost a single limb but all of them, the phantom sensations tingling through his vacant body.

Steve has already adapted to this sensation. It is okay now; it’s not painful. Although it feels peculiar and downright uncomfortable, it’s okay. The Glow, just like The Abyss, has been kind to him.

It is only when the white has filled the last speck of black that the full power of this place hits him. He does not know what to do when he hears the angry mutters of a thousand voices with no bodies to connect them to. He does not know what to do when he feels a thousand palms stroke at his face that is not there.

He does not know how to answer when it is asked.

“Who are you?” He also does not know how to answer, nor does he know how he hears it. It is clear, though, like a telepath’s would be in his mind. He decides that his only option is to answer in the same way.

He still does not know his last name so he states the single ‘s’ sound before his name comes out: “Steve”. The voices rise in volume even if it is not in the definition of the word, it’s only in his mind. It is like they begin to overlap and chorus until there is one unanimous question. All in different languages; each as understandable as the next, just as if they were speaking English.

“How did you get here?” He does not quite know what they mean but he answers honestly.

“I think I was sent here.” His words muddle and it takes a few attempts for them to be clear in his mind, projected like he himself was the telepath until the others acknowledged it. By now, he was sure that they could not hear his thoughts, only what he gave them: he could not hear their thoughts, at least.

“Are you sure?” It is a single voice and that alone is enough to comfort Steve into answering with more confidence.

“Yes. I think. How did you get here? Where is here?”

“You ask a lot of questions,” the voice huffs, irritated. Steve does not have the heart to be rude to the man for it. “Anyway,’ the gruff voice continues - for a second, Steve really wants to see what the face attached to the voice looks like, or looked like - the background noise of what Steve assumes to be the others in this place distant but attentive. “You are here now, that’s all that matters. This place has many names: heaven, paradise, nirvana. Call it what you’d like. It doesn’t matter. Just like the place you were in before, this place is nothing. As I’m sure you realised. The amount of memories people retain varies but everyone has the common discomfort of remembering their death. So, at least, we know this is the afterlife. Apart from that, it’s all a bit vague. You can speak to people but you cannot see them, nor can you see yourself-” The monotonous tone continues, giving the speech its given a thousand times before.

Steve cuts him off hesitantly, unsure of how to be polite when people couldn’t read his body language at all. “Um, sorry, but you don’t seem to know much about this place at all.”

The voice huffs again, the voice deeper and even more irritated than it had been earlier. “Look, kid, you’re the first person to come here in quite a long time that’s older than the age of ten so I’m not exactly good at the speech giving shit. It’s been a while. Just know that you’re dead, that’s all there is to it. Enjoy the gift of communication with others - that seems to be the only real difference in this place.” The man’s voice fades and Steve knows that’s the closest it’s ever going to get to someone walking out the room.

When the presence of the voice clicks to nothing, the slight buzz in his mind coming to an abrupt stop, he finds only a few words on his lips: “then why am I here?” He remains in silence and ignores the persistent nagging in the back of his mind that tells him that this is a nightmare. Where he had once felt isolated in the peace of the black, he suddenly feels suffocated by the exposure of the white.

Somewhere, sometime, he just wishes for grey. But compromises aren’t always available, are they?

Steve learns to isolate the voices over time and soon the white wash becomes little more than white noise in the vast darkness. The Glow is no prize for him but he is learning to accept it, just as he had The Abyss - even if he knows, without the ambiguity that he has before, that this place is the final place.

For all of his struggles, there was one thing that he could not silence. Different languages, different accents, different stages of life; he likes to think of them as prayers, some of them are, he thinks. He remembers praying himself now. He remembers the idea of God. Even in death, though, he still has faith that God exists. That alone is enough to pull at his fragile heartstrings, ones that had always held such curiosity and faith.

He hears the prayers often and always. He can push some out. It depends on their strength: again, he thinks. Some are louder than others, more desperate. They hurt sometimes, like Steve can feel their pain.

“Um...please help. I- I think my wife’s in a bad place. A very bad place. I don’t want her to do something she regrets so please...please just help her.” There are ones like these that happen so often, with such fervour and faith that Steve almost cannot push them away. He doesn’t know why it is him who hears them, or if he’s the only one. Nonetheless, he hates it. He lived a good life and he has been rewarded by being subjected to listening to others’ dire ones. He did nothing to deserve this.

It is not because he is annoyed that he has to listen. No, Steve has always had a hero complex and to not be able to help to help these people is...agonising. The helplessness claws at him and begs for him to just do something. Steve had never taken well to being helpless. Having suffered majorly from a Napoleon complex, on top of the constant illness, he’d found that the best way to avert his anger was through helping others. He became selfless and in doing so, he no longer suffered the effects of his own self-deprecation. He’d lived a good, selfless life, even if it had been born from selfish motivations: what human was perfect?

Now, with the gentle, tantalising whispers in his ears, he cannot help but cringe away from the voice. But with no body, no real form, he can only do it in his mind. He curls up, tucking himself away from the noise but it rings as loud as ever. What is meant to be bliss has become torment. He begs silently to be let out of this hell and fall back into the black void of the past. He’d liked it there. Even with the aching loneliness of the darkness surrounding him, it had felt somewhat final, even if he had wanted to move onto a better place. Now, his self-entitlement is being punished; this place is a hell for the good.

Or maybe Steve had been wrong and he hadn’t been good at all. His hell would be no different to this.

He begs once more.

It is like his own prayer is being answered when he finds himself looking at - or simply perceiving - a small glowing square. For the most part, there is no change, simply a brighter tint in the corners of the square. Until it starts growing longer, the edges become lines and the square is formed, like a glowing ring in the already blinding white. Steve pushes forward, phantom hand reaching out towards the ethereally beautiful square, feeling somewhat like he is closing in on an escape.

But an escape is never easy.

“That’s a bad idea.” Steve turns, but of course it makes no difference. Whether it is just that he can’t turn or that the other person has no corporeal form makes no difference; when he moves he still sees the door in the same place in his vision and the voice just as loud. Suddenly he feels immobile, like he can’t move at all. Maybe he can’t. He’s not quite sure what moving is anymore.

Steve reaches out once more, begging for phantom sensation when he imagines his flesh hand touching the glistening flames that make up the looming square.

“I told you that it was a bad idea,” the voice repeats, much different to the last: gentler, softer, most likely female. Yet still very much irritated.

“What is?” Steve feigned ingenuousness but the voice only scoffed. “The thing you’re trying to touch. Don’t.”

“What is it?” Steve asks. He wants to at least know what it is that he’s avoiding before he does so.

“I don’t think I should tell you.”

“And I’ll touch it if you don’t so go on,” Steve snaps, his patience worn thin over what could have been hours, or weeks, or years, or millennia. He’s sick of the confusion. This is death, death is not supposed to be more confusing than life. He was supposed to be granted peace, all he’s got is some irritatingly patronising voices and desperate pleas for help. If not for the situation at hand, he’d say he wishes to die.

The voice sighs, muttering something lightly under their breath, before speaking. “It’s a door, a portal, a way of getting from here to somewhere else. We all have them. They don’t make much sense. It takes you to where you want to be.”

“So I could leave here?” Steve asks immediately, his whole being suddenly desperate to push forward and engulf himself in the burning flames of stardust.

“If you wished. You can return to Earth. I would recommend that you do not.”

“And why not?” He replies, ever stubborn.

“We are not supposed to go back to Earth. That much is clear. Once we come here, something changes. I have seen a lot of people come here. I’ve seen a lot of people ruin themselves. People always return to Earth out of selfish reasons and it always ends in chaos. Look at Zeus, he’s become a human legend. He came to us so kind and loving. He’d lived a good life. Then he practically goes and destroys humanity. Meddling with humans never ends well,” the voice sighs and Steve can imagine the softness of their eyes as they try and explain. Steve understands, he really does. He pulls back his hand, or what he believes of it to be there, and sighs, wistfully staring at the door.

“Does it ever go away?” He asks, knowing that the temptation would diminish if he could at least take the door out of his sight.

“I have never been able to.” The voice comments, beginning to fade.

“Wait!” Steve shouts suddenly, desperate to cling onto the only bit of social contact he’d had since his odd introductory speech. “You sound as if you knew Zeus. Just how old are you?” Steve was confounded, barely managing to wrap his head around the possibility that people here were not just decades old but thousands of years old, the very first humans.

“I’m afraid I cannot answer that for I do not know. You must have noticed that time passes unconventionally down there. The last person I know to pass to the human realm must have gone down in...the 1500s. The newest person I’ve talked to died in the 1700s. It’s a shame, really. I think we can guess by now that God is never going to appear but since faith has been lost, many less people have been leading good lives. I’m sure there are still some. I cannot talk to everyone here. There are simply too many. When did you die?” Steve wants to gape. He’s never thought he would hear those words strung together. Not only is this woman thousands of years old, he’s also just been told that the way he led his life was futile and the God he led it for does not exist. _And then_ has been asked how he died. Steve is confused - that much is clear.

“The 1940s.”

“Oh wow! Time really does pass.” The woman breathes wistfully and Steve wishes, once again, almost desperately, that he can see her - or him, he’s confused as to why he hasn’t asked. It just feels...wrong. Almost unnecessary.

“What’s your name?” Steve suddenly asks, pretending to close his eyes and imagining the woman beside him. Long brown hair, wavy, falling all the way down to her waist, blending with her just slightly tanned skin, brown eyes innocently staring into the distance, even if they have seen centuries of war and death. Steve likes the image. Steve likes her.

“Meloda. How about you?”

“Steve.”

“Well it was very nice to meet you, Steve. I hope to talk again soon. And remember, for your own sake, do not go near that door.” The voice fades and the faint buzz dissipates to nothing and Steve feels the gentle ache of being alone again.

“Bye Meloda,” he whispers into the light, hoping that they can hear him - he still does not understand how communication functions in this realm.

He breathes in and out, quelling the urge to touch the flaming square and stares at it instead, inspecting it. There’s not much to it. He does not understand its appeal, really. Zeus must know more about it, Steve thinks, a myth yet spoken of like he is real. One of the first humans, possibly? Steve isn’t sure. Maybe he could ask Meloda later?

Steve remains his stubborn self, though, and with so much time on his hands he cannot help but doubt Meloda’s logic. Sure, Zeus had caused havoc - or he had in many of the myths Steve had heard, back when the nurses had read to him in his hospital bed when his pneumonia was at its worst - but one man cannot be held accountable for all of these people’s actions. Zeus was seen as a God and therefore he must have taken power for granted. Steve would not. He would learn from the past.

Steve likes thinks of himself as an academic, or at least a rational thinker, even with his lack of actual education. He thinks his curiosity certainly makes up for it. And, if history has shown him what’s bad, he would learn from that and do what is good. He’s sure of that.

Steve cannot help it when his mind starts to call them cowards, scared of past mistakes. He cannot help it when he leans towards the glowing square and revels in its phantom heat. Meloda warned him of people like them causing chaos down on Earth because they’d gone for themselves, tarnishing a life of good with a death of bad simply because they knew there was no punishment left. So, in turn, they let themselves become proud. Steve would not. Steve would do it for those that were crying out for him. He needs to help. He needs it.

 _They_ need it.

Steve would allow his own selfishness if it was to benefit others, a rule he has abided by for the larger section of his life. It saved him from sacrificing his life for others whilst still allowing himself to give almost all of himself to others in the form of kindness, charity, a broken nose. Even in death, he knew that he would continue doing that. This place is hellish and so is Earth. There is no good part of life and death, it is only what Steve will make it.

So he’s going to help, he decides.

He reaches out to the door, not yet touching it, blocking out the alarmed voices around him, ignoring the overwhelming feels of loneliness and focusing on his task. Someone down there needs him and he’s going to go down there and help them, in any way he can.


	2. Angel On Fire

 

**JAMES BARNES - MANCHESTER, ENGLAND**

[Bucky](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kZYpJ74LKlI) just wants some plums. It’s not that he even particularly likes plums but anything’s better than the incessant buzz of his phone that alerts him of the dire situation about to occur. He knows the more he ignores it, the worse it will get yet he cannot find it within himself to dig around in his back pocket and answer the strenuous group chat that won’t stop bugging him about tonight. He’s already been invited. He’s already said no.

He already knows he’ll be going.

After paying the woman, thanking her profusely for her discount, he carries the bag of plums - and an array of different food stuffs - back to the house. The crumbling building had originally been a great plan; a house share between six of them, sharing the rent and having a bedroom each. Half a year later, Bucky’s beginning to realise that the idea has not been so great after all. The communal kitchen had become a hub of stolen meals and bitter arguments. The bedrooms no longer resembled privacy after multiple kicked in doors and loud arguments. The living room, supposed to be a shared space, has become a place to throw parties - which Bucky realises now that he’d much rather avoid.

He’s in his second year of University now, studying sports science, a decision he’s already readily regretted. He was never the academic type and he would have been better off trying to join a team early on or at least study something general, allowing himself the option to opt out of sport. But no, he’d been good at sports so he’d kept at it - his predilection to Biology over any other science helping profusely, even if he found it dull. So, rather than throwing himself into the professional world of sport, he’s now surrounded by a multitude of students ranging from arrogant, posh twats (although, he had to admit, some of them were unfairly intelligent) to the dumbest people he’s ever found slip into University (and he’s quick to say that the larger quartile of this section also went under ‘posh, arrogant twats’) to the friendly middle ground he’s been trying to slip into.

He hasn’t been succeeding very well.

Crashing into his room and slamming it as a warning to the rest of his rambunctious roommates, he slips the food into a mini fridge he’d invested in that hardly kept anything fresh but made it last at least an extra day without going mouldy. To be honest, it’s no worse than their actual fridge which is now direfully empty.

He falls onto the bed with a heavy sigh, watching the flickering of sunlight through the curtains - a flimsy cotton that gave little to no privacy. He’s drawn into staring at it, losing himself to the myriad of thoughts in his head, letting the world go fuzzy when he hears a voice. “James Buchanan Barnes! You better be coming tonight!” Dugan screams up the stairs, his deep voice bellowing throughout the crumbling walls.

“I’m not sure, I don’t think I’m up for it!” He shouts back. It’s the same reply he always gives.

“And I think you’re lying, so get down here at six o’clock. We’ll go out for some drinks first! Promise this one will be better than last time,” Dugan shouts back. It’s what he always shouts back. Always empty promises. Always it will be better than the last time. If Bucky is honest, being better than last time hardly constitutes to being good at all.

 

 

He groans as he wakes up, surrounded by the chaotic mess of last night. Cleaning this living room is gonna be a _bitch_. How he’d even ended up back here, he’s not really sure. He’s in no way surprised, though. It’s always the same; every single morning, waking up on the floor of his living room or another’s living room or, to be honest, anywhere that wasn’t a bed. He shifts from his spot, wincing as the smashed glass of one of the hundreds of bottles digs viciously into his back. (What the fuck had happened last night?)

“Bucky,” someone groans next to him - he has no idea who it is, only that the voice is mildly irritating and grumbling. He looks down at himself in dismay - of course his clothes had got lost in the fray. He groans once more, smothering his face in his hands, wishing that maybe if he pushed hard enough that he would just disappear. Death feels as appealing as ever.

No, that’s not how he should be thinking, he knows that (he’s told himself this a million times; it doesn’t seem to change a thing. The thoughts still suffocate him, still trap him under their vice-like grip.) In an attempt to distract himself, he tries to collect his memories together, piecing together the glimpses of memories he has. Images flash across his vision like bullets, giving him only enough time to regret his decisions.

The moon had risen enough for Bucky to have seen it by the time anything had really started. His friends, already piss drunk, were stumbling through the mess of the garden, glasses raised in a phantom toast to a phantom ideal that Bucky had no interest in. It wasn’t like Bucky was here out of his own free will, he might as well hate it whilst he could.

Blind to the concerned stares of his friends, Bucky wandered the gardens, no more than sleepwalking through the throng of colliding bodies. Surrounded by them, he let himself be crushed, poisoned by their laughter and chatter and mindless cheering, letting their drinks be spilt; a couple, obnoxiously kissing in the backyard, crashed into him as the wet grass soaked through his cheap trainers. He didn’t realise his breath was gone until it was too late.

He was left cowering in a corner, unattended, unable to call for help in some sort of hope for his salvageable pride. He knew he had to get back up, had to run back into the crowd before someone found him but his breath was lost, his chest constricting until he felt the phantom hand around his throat. He tried to ignore all thoughts of the future, gasping for breath, knowing that doing as little as that was what he needed to do to survive this. He managed to get this far, managed to walk here with his friends and walk into the house with a thousand eyes staring at him, he’d managed the fucking _hard_ part. Why could he just get out of this corner and speak and laugh and fall in love just like the rest of them? That’s what people were _supposed_ to do!

At some point, when the panic bled into tears and threw him into heaving sobs and lunged back into a dead-like calm, he wiped at his eyes, holding his breaths to hold in what was clawing to come out and dragged himself back into the crowd, hiding his reddened eyes in the cover of darkness, away from prying eyes.

He integrated himself into conversation, aware of how much he spoke, carefully choosing his words: don’t say too much, don’t say too little. His incessant thoughts only led to person after person awkwardly shifting away, each time replaced by another person. Some tried to talk, some tried to help when they saw the redness around his eyes when the lights shone a little too bright. Some ignored him, some didn’t care how felt, or how he thought, only that he might be a good bang if he was up to it.

He wasn’t.

Slowly, his friends got drunk enough to forget about him (he thought; he was wrong) and he was lost to the sea of strangers, wading back and forth in the tossing and turning and chatter and laughter and screams and cries. Overwhelmed, he stumbled to the centre of the party, people crowded around a keg-stand that he thought only existed back in America. Someone was chugging down something, Bucky didn’t care what, everyone watching in fascinating awe.

The girl came down, wiping her mouth with a laugh and Bucky immediately took her place, relishing in the proud cheers of the crowd, begging for the attention. In all these strangers, not a single person recognised him. The back of his head screamed for him to make them like him. Make new friends. Replace the old ones. Do something grand; do something that will _impress_ them. Maybe these guys would understand him. He scoffed, as if that was likely, he’d have met them chugging a keg at a party, that’s not exactly a stable place to start. Giving into his fate and accepting the vacant companionship of cheering, he copied whatever the girl had done with ease.

When he finished, he wiped his mouth and stumbled to the nearest girl, sticking their lips together before stumbling to the boy next to her and pushing his lips onto theirs too, grabbing them both by the hand and dragging them over to him. With vivid imagination, he could remember a time in which this was natural to him, when he did this for fun and not out of desperation. He drew from that, pretended that he was still like that, that he hadn’t changed, that he was still the teenager he was desperately trying to be - he just wanted to have fun, even if by trying to, he was stripping himself of that entirely.

He was fading. Everything was fading. Colour turned to grey and his smile turned to a frown but he powered on: _fuck this_ , he was gonna have fun. He was determined to find happiness, even when all he was doing was tainting the white glimmers of hope a deep black. He was a desperate attempt at a copy of what he used to be, clinging onto an era long gone that everyone else seemed to have perfect ability to remain happy in.

The girl and boy attacked him from either side and he let them, lying there and staring blankly at the ceiling. Do what they will, he’d let them. He wanted them, he said to himself. Nevertheless, he couldn’t stop his mind from drifting, his old-self punishing him with memories and flashbacks and happiness. He remembered being the centrepiece of his old school, back in Brooklyn, even winning his title as prom King beside that girl he’d loved - or thought he had, at least. He had the popularity scale figured and was at the top, everything wrapped around his spoilt finger.

Then he moved to England at 17, forcing himself into the new place with a forced smile and a determination to make friends. He had. He’d even made it to the top of the hierarchy of his new school. But he heard the whispers behind his back, he knew that they pitied him - he’s that boy from America, ‘looks cute but he’s just... I dunno, odd.’ He’d tried to much, flown too close to the sun and plummeted into the sea. He’d laughed too hard, talked too loud and tried too much until all his friends weren’t his friends at all.

Over time, leaving school and then moving onto University (he still wishes he’d moved back to America for college), a newfound anxiety had taken hold and his social skills fell into further falseness. Conversation became impossible without a facade, masking his anxiety with confident smiles and struts, flirting and laughing, all so much quieter than he had before. He still held the power to hold the room but now the attention, no matter how much he craved it, tore him apart.

He made friends at University too. He lived with them. But they never asked how he was. Or what he wanted. Or what he thought on this or that: somewhere, sometime, his opinion had become redundant. He didn’t know how or why or when it had happened and he hated himself for it. Self-blame seemed to commandeer his life.

They pushed and pushed and pushed him and he accepted it, all in the name of fun and friends and ‘the best days of his life’.

With a newfound panic, he pushed the boy and girl off, his breath cutting off for just a moment. This was a mistake, a _fucking_ mistake. But with their hands off his body, he was left vacant, his body vying for attention it could so easily have. Within he second, he was allowing them back, brushing it off with a chuckle and letting his night continue, his drunken mind lost to staring at the dancing ceiling lights.

And now he’s here, naked, watching as Gabe picks himself off the floor - nice and clothed - grumbling about his hangover and holding out a hand for Bucky, who takes it and slips into the closest clothes he finds, only a single one of them being his own - the expensive jeans that he refuses to lose.

“What time is it?” He grumbles, squinting at the mass of bodies on the floor.

“About four in the morning. Come on, let’s go home. I’ve got a lecture in a few hours.” Bucky nodded, too tired to argue and stumbled after Gabe to their small groups of friends, who had already called a cab.

The taxi journey was full of stories and laughter, each of their friends recalling the best moments of the night. “Better than last time, right Buck?” Dugan asks. Bucky nods, feeling that there’s nothing else he can do, and forces a smile. They accept it.

The sun's rising by the time they return home and Bucky only has until 9am to get some sleep, the frigid February air keeping him awake, and get to the campus. Stuck in his own hypnagogic curse, he stares at the ceiling, tears welling in his reddening eyes. His life’s on a downward spiral, maddening and fast, uncontrollable. What is he to anyone anymore? He has his friends and he knows they’ve become just as numb to his presence as he has to theirs - something about that loss of novelty leaves the hole in his chest open and aching. His family are scattered, his mother and father working down the country in London, his three sisters all attending different boarding schools, his parents too stuck in the whirlwind of their jobs to stay with them, letting them grow up alone with heavy hearts. Nonetheless, they had all remained in the South. Apart from him. He’d wanted an escape, as most teenagers do, and decided that going up North would do him good. A fresh start, he’d told himself.

This is anything but a fresh start.

The ceiling begins to blur and the cracks become smudges and a single tear finally rolls down his puffy cheekbones. The hangover is starting to dawn on him, even with his lack of sleep (apart from the three hours he’d spent passed out on the floor) and his head is starting to crack open and bleed (metaphorically, of course).

The mess of his emotions and pain leads him to do whatever stupidity and foolishness this is. He wonders what the report would look like: 21-year-old failing University student commits suicide, another one to add to the statistic. Another one in the masses of men taking their own lives at his age.

It makes him feel even worse.

Well, at least he’s leaving something behind, maybe his death might help a few others out: he’s seen articles like that.

He’d grown up in Brooklyn with a family originating in Ireland and with that came Catholicism. His belief in God is rather thin but there’s an inkling in the back of his mind that tells him that maybe, just maybe, God exists. He’s not really sure. He doesn’t like not being sure. Bucky Barnes is nothing if not stubborn and if he cannot be absolute, then his stubbornness just crumbles around him.

For the first time in his life, he allows himself some faith and just believes. He knows praying before suicide will not get him any closer to heaven and it might just make him fall further into hell but the desperation is beginning to blur his judgement so he does so anyway.

The heady red glow of the clock face reads seven in the morning when he plants himself on his knees by the side of his bed and clasps his hands together, elbows tucked neatly to his chest, clasped hands resting on the bed, his forehead hovering just above them. With his eyes shut purposefully, he begins to speak with chopped, monosyllabic locution.

_“I’m sorry…_

_I didn’t really think it would ever come to his. I don’t think I even really want this. But I think I have to… I think that might make me stupid but I don’t really care. Look at me. God, throwing myself a pity party when it’s not even anyone else’s fault. Fuck, my thoughts are all over the place right now. I must not be making sense. I don’t really care as long as you’re listening. Can’t really control what my thoughts are doing…_

(I hate myself.)

_Anyway, I should probably start this somewhere, shouldn’t I?_

_I don’t want to die, that’s probably a good place to begin this at. I don’t want to live either, I think that much is clear. I’m toeing the line and at this rate, dying sounds a little better. Probably not the best reason to take your own life, right? I mean, you said I shouldn't. Really, I should just take this as it is: an episode. But…I can’t. Sounds stupid, right? But I just can’t. It’s just not fucking worth it anymore. I don’t care that you said I shouldn’t. But wouldn’t it be great if I just listened to the rules for once?_

(I hate being alive.)

_My mother’s going to be angry. Can’t really imagine her being sad, though. She’s pretty much already learnt to live without us. She never seems all that happy when I call her anymore (I guess she doesn’t sound sad either). No one does, really. And well, doesn’t that sound self-deprecating. It’s true, though. Sure, I understand that they would grieve and all but it wouldn’t affect their lives that much. Maybe others would pity them for having the ‘son who killed himself’. I’m sure they’ll overcome that, though. They knew I was useless from the start. It’s okay._

(I hate the thought of dying.)

_I guess I’m just here to ask for forgiveness, of some sort. I know that this is a sin, that’s stated pretty clearly in that book of yours. But I think I can be redeemed. I think I’ve been good for a lot of my life. I haven’t been mean. I haven’t been cruel (not that I can think of anyway). Do I really deserve hell for letting myself go just a little early?_

_If anything, I’m just hoping for at least one person to know that I’m not trying to do this out of cruelty. I don’t want to write a note, I’m not that eloquent - this is bad enough and it’s only in my head, it doesn’t even make any fucking sense - so you’ll be the one to understand but isn’t it you in the end who chooses which of us are worthy of heaven?_

_I guess I should thank you for listening…_

(I hate myself more than I hate the thought of dying.)

_I hope to see you soon,_

_Even if that’s impossible._

_Please, just give me the bravery to follow this through. For everyone else whose life I’m bringing down..”_

Bucky pauses, finalising his speech with a shaky breath and lets his hands collapse. As the situation dawns on him, his stomach rolling at the thought, he crawls to his feet, wringing out his hands and trying to retain the willpower to go through with this. He pushes into the bathroom (an ensuite, he can’t pretend he didn’t get the nicest room in the house. Maybe someone better can have it now), hunched and awkward, his steps stilted and fumbling. Fear rages above everything else, the dull panic forcing a throbbing headache to attack his skull.

He switches the lights on with gusto, as if that will make him feel better about this all, like this is meaningful and not cowardly. He’s lying to himself, he should probably just accept that by now. This is for himself as much as it is everyone else because above all, he’s a burden to himself. What must have been three years of being a tortuous burden has finally ended in this: the epitome of his craven attitudes.

As the light flickers, he rummages around the cabinets (he doesn’t notice the tears streaming down his cheeks until he’s leaving puddles on the floor) until he finds a box of year-old painkillers, tucked somewhere at the back where they would not be used nor seen. Opening the packet, he presses his thumbnail forcefully into each little pocket of foil and pushes each of the twelve (not enough, he hopes secretly) little tablets into his palm. He flings the packet into the bin and watches the dusty white pills rustle in his hand, loud and brash in the silence of his own serpentine thoughts.

He thinks suddenly: this is how I’m going to die. At the age of 22, in a grim house that he shares with his ‘friends’ (he has no other names for them now), with a degree already out of his reach. With a clutch of his hands, his pushes his cowardliness aside (the contradiction still discombobulates him. If it’s cowardly to do so and it’s cowardly not to do so, what options are there?) and puts his fist to his lips.

He doesn’t even realise that his hands have taken a position of prayer and that the last thought flittering through his mind is “help me”.


	3. Angels I

**STEVE ROGERS - THE ABYSS**

[The](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eY6ERwMQudo) growing whiteness does not relieve his lungs, stuck in suffocation as the anxiety wraps around his invisible body. Worst of all, he knows that the squeezing of his lungs is not going to end - death cannot relieve him anymore, he’s stuck in a perpetual loop, suffering death-mongering activities without final relief. Trying to alleviate the stress of his chest, he tries to float, tries to capture the gentle feeling - a product of his own mind - calming the panicked buzzing of his mind into a low drone, ever present but quiet. Above the buzzing is the voices, the ones that he can’t relieve himself off, always speaking, always talking, always screaming at him to do-

To do what?

He doesn’t know.

More than anything, though, it is the presence of the door that taunts him. With the knowledge of what it is, what it can do, where is can lead, Steve feels it impossible to stop staring at the faint glow of a square that is not even physical matter, or a wave, or a particle: it is there, whether the rules of physics allow it to be or not.

He does not know why the word ‘Schrödinger’ comes to mind but he knows it relates to the door. The door that is there but not, stuck in a state between reality and dreaming, there but not, unable to prove its existence until its within his sight, a place in the universe that is in complete balance between chaos and calm.

Steve knows with a sudden urgency that the low drone has returned to a high pitch squeal of anxiety, pumping adrenaline through his clear veins. What is is about the door that is so frightening? Is it what is on the other side? Is it the unease that surrounds the dim glow?

Steve blinks, or believes he does (at this point, it means the same thing) and even then, when the white turns to a phantom black, he sees the door. He knows then that it is in his mind as much as the rest of it and unless he wills it away, it will forever be there.

Giving into the knowledge that he does not want it to go, (he wants to touch it) he inspects the ethereal unknown. The light is just the same as it has always been, loud and unforgiving. He calls this place The Glow only for how bright it is yet, despite that, this glow is brighter. Whilst the white blinds him, the glow draws him in because it is beyond light - it is not light but a bright whiteness. It is the true opposite of nothing, the true white to the black. The Glow is like an unforgiving light in a disregarded bathroom whilst the brightness of the square is something...beyond that, beyond reality: almost as if he’s openly staring at the sun.

He reaches forward to touch it but finds that his hand moves right through it (again, at this point, he’s just happy to imagine that the hand is there rather than dwelling on the absence of it). He feels nothing - he expected that - he just feels the disappointment sink in. He wonders, though, if touching it does not work, how he is meant to travel to the other side.

Maybe he’s better off not knowing.

Letting the white wash over him again, he tries to breathe. Maybe one of the few advantages to this place - without a body, asthma (alongside the rest of his myriad of illnesses) no longer exist. He breathes in and out (and in and out) over and over until he finally feels the thoughts wipe from his mind, leaving him blank.

“I don’t think I even really want this.”

With a gasp, Steve latches onto the sudden sound, ignoring any prior thoughts with unbridled urgency. The faint whisper grows until it is only slightly louder than the mild drone that Steve knows will never end (something he’s beginning to accept).

“I don’t want to die, that’s probably a good place to begin this at.”

Steve doesn’t know why some parts are louder than others (he still doesn’t seem to know that much at all), why some glimpses seem to stick out like a diamond in the rough (not that the words are all that nice) but his heart squeezes at the implications of this man’s words. Or, at least, he thinks it’s a man. For some reason, the picture of the man he’s hearing has never been clearer; he thinks, maybe, that with all this ‘no-body-nonsense’ he’s growing better at putting a face to a voice.

“I guess I’m just here to ask for forgiveness, of some sort.”

Steve tenses and listens further, trying to pick out the muffled sound of the man’s voice - brown hair, he imagines, but with blue eyes (just like all the men in those magazines he’d stolen off his mother that he couldn’t help but stare at - not that it meant anything). Only now, listening so closely, can he hear the pain rapturing in the man’s voice. Steve isn’t surprised, no matter how uncomfortable that makes him.

Then, “help me”.

Steve goes through the door.

 

 

**BUCKY BARNES - MANCHESTER, ENGLAND**

Bucky has a fist to his lips, a dozen pills tucked away between sweating fingers, when it first happens: first, a blinding white light (somewhere, at some point, he’ll learn to laugh at how cliched is it) and then a man, eyes wide, body at least six-foot tall with shoulders the size of London. He’s just standing there, body coiled for attack, looking like he might just reach out and wrestle Bucky’s demons to the floor.

In his panic, Bucky does he one of the only reasonable things he does that night and the one thing you’re probably supposed to do when there’s an intruder in your home: attack them. Unfortunately, though, despite being built up over years of sports, his body decided that it’s not strong enough to pummel into this building of a man and instead, his hands fumble for the bag of plums (which are sitting in his ice cold bathroom, one that will ever be colder than the fridge), taking one out and pitching it directly at the man’s head.

Pills scatter to the floor, his eyes grow wide and a realisation dawns over him. He, despite all better judgement, just _threw a plum_ at the intruder. _A plum_. A plum! “Who the fuck are you?” He demands in a vague hope to cover his embarrassment. The man blanches before a deep red flush takes over his face and takes a step back, looking like he’s half way to holding his hands up and surrendering. “Who. Are. You.” Bucky enunciates, gritting his teeth and narrowing his eyes, pretending to be the threatening macho man that he has never actually accomplished. For a sports player, he can’t help but feel meek in the face of anything that might give him a chance to show strength.

“My name is Steve Rogers and I-”

He’s cut off by Bucky’s dismissal. “I don’t give a fuck about the rest. Why the fuck are you in my house? Also, _how_ the fuck are you in my house?” Bucky doesn’t swear often (well, he tells himself that) but the sudden adrenaline rush and pumping anxiety has his mouth running like it never has before.

“I...I don’t know.” The man, Steve, replies.

“Well that’s a fucking lie. Tell me how the fuck you got into my bedroom. Was it Dugan? He seems to think that me being gay constitutes to me letting him invite random guys into my house.” Although, not a single one had ever come to his bedroom.

“Um...no. I came because...well, you sounded like you needed help.” Steve’s sincerity has Bucky’s heart palpitating wildly.

“What the fuck are you talking about?”

“You...you sounded like you were about to do something bad,” Steve can’t bring himself to say Bucky’s real intentions aloud, “I heard what you said and I had to come.” Steve admits, albeit awkwardly, shuffling his feet, ignoring how big they are (he’s yet to see his own body).

“You what?”

“You said help me and I came.”

“No I fucking didn't. And even if I did, how the fuck did you get in here?”

Steve pauses, he has no answer. “What year is it?” He asks abruptly, looking fearfully at the unfamiliar surroundings (this had been a bad idea, such a _fucking_ bad idea).

“What year- fucking hell, who are you?” Bucky’s tongue is tied as he gapes at the man across from him, staring him down from head to toe (and maybe, whilst he’s at it, he gets a good look at those _muscles_ but he’ll take that to his grave).

“Steve Rogers.”

“And you don’t know what year it is.”

“Not a clue.”

“And you don’t know how you got in my room.”

“Not really.”

“Not really?”

“You wouldn’t understand.”

“Fucking hell!” Bucky flings his arms in the air, approaching the man with gusto until he is nose to nose with him, his eyes tilting up just slightly to meet the other man’s gaze. “Who the fuck are you, Steve Rogers, to say I wouldn’t understand? You think I’m dumb?” This has gotten out of hand.

“No, no! I didn’t say that! This situation is...complicated. I just wanted to help.”

“Help?! With what?! Stopping me from killing myself because thanks a lot for that, I’m ever so grateful to be alive!” Bucky spits sarcastically, flinging his arms up once again (he has a penchant for melodrama). “Seriously, who the fuck are you?”

“I am Steve Rogers.” Steve repeats for the thousandth time.

“And who the fuck is that?!”

“You should really stop swearing.” The glare Bucky pins at Steve shuts him up quicker than his own mother. “Okay, okay. Forget that.” Steve holds his hands up, in an attempt to pacify, ever the arbiter. He takes a deep breath, closing his eyes for a second before revealing the ice-cold blue behind them. “I’m Steve Rogers and I was...dead.”

“Dead?” Bucky repeats incredulously.

“Since 1934.”

“What?! Seriously, did Dugan send you? Is this some sort of elaborate plan?”

“Not at all.”

“I’m gonna admit here and now that I’m absolutely fucking terrified so if this is some sort of prank, please stop.” The desperation on Bucky’s face is enough for Steve to soften his stance.

“I’m sorry I’m scaring you; I didn’t mean for this to happen. Let’s start again, shall we? Just pretend you invited me in here and let me explain?”

Bucky, still scared out of his wits, nods silently. Steve begins slowly. “Okay, so you know my name and when I died,” Steve sighs, “if I’m honest, I don’t know much else. I hardly remember anything.” Steve scratches his head awkwardly. “I died of pneumonia, I think, when I was sixteen-”

“You don’t look sixteen,” Bucky interrupts automatically. Steve looks down at himself and gapes. “Okay, um, well,” Steve hates how awkward he is, even now, “I didn’t use to look like this. I was...small, I think. The memories really are hazy. No, I was definitely smaller.” Steve motions to the centre of his chest with a horizontal palm, “I was probably only about the height. I’m going by the way everything looks a lot smaller.”

Steve’s confusion calms Bucky somewhat. Despite there being a creepy maniac who has broken into his home, Bucky now realises that he’s not going to be hurt. This man isn’t a psycho, just a little insane (or so Bucky hopes because the alternative is a little far-fetched).

In spite of Bucky’s thoughts, Steve continues. “I remember where I used to live. Brooklyn, I think. The hospital I was in had Brooklyn in the name. Brooklyn is a place, right?”

Bucky nods. “Yeah, I grew up there too.”

Steve smiles shyly. “Yes, so, I grew up in Brooklyn. I don’t really sound like you, though, maybe I lost the accent.” In fact, Steve sounded very… British? “Anyway, moving on...okay, I don’t really have anything else to say. Um, how about a sorry? I think I know enough to know that appearing in someone’s bedroom isn’t really something you’re supposed to do. Or maybe it’s just because you’re looking at me like I’m insane.”

Bucky stares at him before replying sharply. “You might be, why else would you be here with no memories? I don’t know you, you don’t know me and for some reason you think you’re from the forties. Also, how the hell did you know what I was doing? Do you have cameras installed?”

Steve’s reply is just as quick as Bucky’s, confusing masking his new face. “I think if I had a camera, you’d see it, they’re not exactly small.”

“No, not like a camera camera but like a bug or something so you can hear me or see me or whatever.”

“A bug? How would that help me.”

“Oh dear God, you really take this forties thing seriously.”

“It’s true!”

“So, what? You died in 1934 and then somehow appear in 2018 with a new body and very few memories. Sounds plausible,” Bucky sighs sarcastically.

“It’s 2018?”

Bucky groans loudly, running a hand down his face exasperatedly. “Yes, it’s 2018!” Bucky pulls out his phone; Steve stares at it like it’s magic. “February 5th, to be exact.”

“What is that?” Steve points to the phone.

“My phone.”

“Doesn’t look like a phone…”

“Oh for fuck’s sake, I get it, you’re from the forties. This,” he points dramatically at the screen, “is a modern smartphone and it can do much more than whatever a phone used to be able to do. Get used to stuff like this, if we’re rolling with this there’s gonna be a lot you don’t know. Oh fucking hell, I’m talking like I’m letting you stay.”

Steve sighs and looks down at his clasped hands, shoulders slumped. He peers up through his eyelids and gives the most depressing puppy eyes Bucky has ever seen. “You’re not letting me stay?”

“Okay, I know you’re confused Steve but seriously, think it from my view: some random stranger just turned up in my bedroom before I...before I did something bad,” he can only find it within himself to repeat the exact words Steve had used earlier, “telling me that he’s from last century and is also some kind of living dead zombie thing. Would you not think that it would be a bit hard to believe?”

Steve sighs, his eyes looking lost as he trails the marks of dirt in the carpet. “Yeah, that makes sense.”

Bucky smiles thankfully, trying to ignore the pain in his heart as he watches a six-foot-tall man look like a kicked puppy. Before the awkward silence can continue, though, Steve adds one last thing. “But… and I know we’re not really addressing what was...happening before I came here but I want you to know that it really would be a bad idea. Your mother would care, you would regret it but would be powerless to change your choice, you don’t want this - I heard as much. I know this is prying but I just… I just really don’t want you to go through with this so please, believe me, don’t do it.” Bucky gapes at the man, at a complete loss for words. This man - insane man - has just broken into his home and is telling him not to kill himself.

What the fuck has his life become?

Yet, one thing nags the back of his mind. If the guy had installed bugs (Bucky doesn’t even know when he could have done that) he still wouldn’t have heard what he said. Yet, this man is throwing everything he’s said - no, thought - back in his face. He’s sure he didn’t speak aloud, everything was in his head. So how the hell had this man heard what he was thinking?

“I won’t,” Bucky finds himself whispering, almost against his will, as he stares wide-eyed at the man (beautiful, his traitorous mind supplies). Who _is_ he?

“Thank you.” Steve smiles brighter and takes a step forward, holding a placating hand out in front of him. “I’m sorry I scared you, this is just as scary for me too. I… I don’t know what’s going on, I just heard - I don’t even know how - and I had to help. Sorry.”

Bucky doesn't know where he musters the trust from but he smiles back at the man. “There’s no need to apologise.” This man broke into his house. “You’re just as confused as I am,” he says, almost like he’s trying to convince himself but he can’t trust this man, he thinks - he’s never seen so much honest pour off someone’s features. He pauses. “Maybe...you could stay for a bit?” The smile on Steve’s face makes it all worth it. The smile brightens the room as all tension rolls from his soldiers. (Bucky should know by now that this is driven from a desperate need for human interaction but to realise that would be to devalue the entire situation).

“I’d love that.” Bucky doesn’t know why he feels like he’s just solidified a deal but in the future he’ll realise that maybe he has.

Bucky quickly glances at his phone again, it’s not even eight o’clock yet but he knows he’s not going to make it to his morning lecture - he’s willing to get the slack for it, anyway.

He sits on his bed and wipes a hand over his face. “So, the forties, huh?” Bucky starts awkwardly.

“Yeah, the forties.”

“And you died at sixteen. That’s…”

“Depressing?”

“Yeah.”

“It’s fine. I’m back, aren’t I?”

“That’s the bit that’s hard to get my head around.”

“There’s probably a death certificate out there. The hospital might have it, I don’t really know what happens with a death certificate. It’s probably in Brooklyn, anyway. We could always look around for it.” Steve shrugs (they both know they won’t look for it. Bucky because he’s scared for Steve to be right. Steve because he knows that seeing his death certificate will make this all painfully real).

“We’re in England,” Bucky dead-pans, unamused.

“Is England far from Brooklyn?” Bucky can’t help it when a laugh escapes his throat, loud and boisterous. It takes him a couple second to catch his breath, looking up at Steve with a smile as bright as then sun and holds his hands out. “Okay, look. Let’s say you manage to get to and through the airport in four hours (and that’s a stretch), the flight is then about seven hours, then getting through the airport on the other side and into Brooklyn might be another three so what is that?” He stares down at his fingers, four held up. “Fourteen hours? And that’s at a minimum, really.”

“Oh.” Bucky laughs again, unable to fight the fuzzy feeling in his chest. There’s something so relieving about being able to talk to a stranger with ease, knowing that you’ll never talk to them again and that their opinion of you has little to no meaning at all. There’s almost no chance he’ll run into Steve again - the man’s dead, for God’s sake - so he’s free to be himself. He feels liberated. (He feels _insane_. This is a stranger!)

Silence quickly falls, though, and Bucky is lost to the usual whirlwind of his thoughts. They’re so common now that he doesn’t even feel particularly hateful of them, mindless worries, panicked thoughts, problems he knows he’s never going to solve, he just accepts them as they come. He doesn’t notice when Steve sits next to him, or places an almost timid hand on his shoulder and asks, “Buck, are you okay?”

Bucky shrugs, ignoring the pleasant feeling he gets when he hears the nickname, and tries to focus on Steve’s voice. “I know you don’t really know me but if you want to talk about it, I’m here.”

Bucky looks over, mind still screaming, hating that he’s so desperate to tell Steve everything. It’s brimming at the edges of his consciousness and begging to be released: the comfort of anyone, even a stranger.

“I can’t. I don’t know you. And seriously, no offence,” Bucky huffs a laugh, “but you’re a bit luny, probably not the best to confide in.”

Steve, despite what his reaction should be, is not offended. “Well, if I’m so luny, what does it matter if you tell me? It’s not as if I have anyone else to talk about you with. Your secrets are safe with me.” And that’s what’s so terrifying.

“Maybe but…”

“Just give it a go?” Steve asks gently, smiling as best as he can, even if the temptation to let this whole situation overwhelm him is looming over his shoulder. Bucky sighs, looking up with wide eyes, feeling like a child all over again and for once in his life, just this once, he lets himself trust someone else.

“I dunno, it’s just…God, I don’t know where I’m supposed to start.”

“How about we start big and get smaller. What’s on your mind the most?”

“I dunno, I guess…my degree. That’s big. I’m doing Sports Science, not exactly a degree that’s gonna get me anywhere. I shouldn’t be doing it…it’s pointless, really. I was really good at football - American football not English - but now I’m here in a country that doesn’t even play it, not even in a team for anything. And I can’t really go professional now, it’s too late. Can’t move back to America when my parents have already paid this years school fees. It’s just…I don’t know, shitty, I guess.”

Steve lets Bucky finishes and mulls over his next words. “I don’t think it’s too late. I know that life has put you in a certain direction but, I mean, I don’t know much about ‘modern day’ stuff or anythin’ but…someone needs to start clubs or teams or somethin’, right? I’m sure there’s a lot of American kids over here who want to see the sport brought over. I’m sure there’ll even be English kids that want it too. I say, get your degree, if that’s what you want. And then, if you can, you could do a multitude of things. You could start a team, you could start bringing the sport to England. Or, you could use your degree. I don’t really know what you do with a Sports degree but there’ll be options, I’m sure of it, otherwise it wouldn’t be available at all,” Steve says with surety, smiling calmly, ignoring the way that Brooklyn lilt is slipping back into his voice - like the memories flittering back are moulding him into what he used to be. “And isn’t that better than joining a team yourself? If you were to make a team, you would be helping a lot of kids, Buck. Probably a few adults too. That’d be hella rewarding.” Bucky mulls it over; Steve’s right, evidently so, and even if Bucky’s fighting so hard to deny it, he can’t. He doesn’t let his hopes rise, he doesn’t let himself think it can happen but he lets his rational believe it, lets himself believe that there are at least _options_. He’s not trapped in a corner, he’s got so many escape routes that he could have taken one years ago.

“I guess…” Bucky allows himself to say.

“There you go,” Steve smiles. “Now, onto number two.”

They chat for hours, so long in fact that Bucky loses track of time. So long that Bucky shouts down to his friends that he’s just on the phone and they all think he’s finally got a boyfriend (or so he assumes from the jeering). Steve asks about them, a smile pulling at the corners of his lips; Bucky answers, a little hesitantly, and suddenly it’s all rolling off his chest. He explains that he doesn’t feel at home in his group of friends, always an outsider to their dynamic; it isn’t that he dislikes them, only that he doesn’t fit in with them. He wants people who he can call himself one of, and the guys he lives with, no matter how much he loves them (because deep down, he thinks he does) just aren’t. He’s just not a party animal, or an outgoing extrovert. He’s Bucky Barnes: a man who feels more mature than his friends, a man who loves to socialise but doesn’t love to get so blind drunk that he regrets it the next morning. He’s James Barnes, the man who’s scared because he still has the feelings of a sixteen-year-old but the intellect of a man trying to get a degree.

Steve listens and helps him weave his pain into productivity. He gives advice, caring and smiling, whilst still retaining the empathy and sincerity it takes for Bucky to really _believe_ him.

Bucky continues on to explain his family situation: all of them split up. His parents divorced, his sisters practically invisible to him. He explains how scared he is that his dad’s moving back to New York. He explains that he doesn’t believe he can even pass his degree with anything more than a third (something often given out as a reward for simply paying the fees). But Steve settles his anxiety like cream on a wound: despite the initial sting, it’s a soothing balm that will help in the long run.

He apologises for his actions in life so far, feeling like he’s as close to confession as he’s ever going to get.

He’s been high for the majority of his adult life, drunk for the rest. He’s lost the reason he does it at all anymore except to make the fucking monsters in his head shut up. It’s time that he showed repentance for his sins.

They talk and talk and talk and just at the moment that Bucky realises that he’s just told his life story to a man who could sell his information for his own gain, he realises that he knows just as well that Steve wouldn’t. Steve, who walked into his bedroom like an angel. Steve, who looks like the sun and walks like he’s on the moon. Steve, who smells of roses (Bucky won’t pretend he hasn’t noticed) and tells him stories of his future that are beginning to sound true.

Bucky doesn’t care that his faith is flawed; Bucky doesn’t care that he thinks that the alternative is ludicrous; he believes it. He believes…

“Are you…are you a guardian angel?” The words are like lunacy rolling off his lips but Steve just smiles, reassuring in just his motions, bludgeoning Bucky’s insecurity with sunlit smiles and softened features.

“I…I don’t know,” Steve admits, features shifting to astute concentration. He smiles again. “I think so, maybe. I’m not so sure about God anymore and it seems kinda like a religious thing but yeah, I think I migh’ be, pal.” Bucky tries hard not to laugh and the glimpses of old fashioned Brooklyn slipping through Steve’s usual vernacular but he can’t restrain the smile tugging at his lips.

“So you don’t…you don’t have any proof about God?”

“No. I don’t think anyone ever does. It’s still about faith, even aft’a death. But I don’t think that’s what matters. I think it’s the morals that are important, the dedication to lead a good life. If everyone lived like tha’ then… well, I’d like that.”

“The morals?”

“Yeah. I grew up with the Catholic ones but there’s plenty over plenty of religions. It’s doing what you believe is right in the name of others. And as long as you’re doing that and that thing is helping others and making them happy and it’s not hurtin’ people, you’re following good morals.” He laughs, scratching at the back of his head awkwardly. “I think plenty of people could put it more eloquently than I can but that’s the gist.”

“I think it makes perfect sense.”

“That’s…thank you. And, I guess now that I’m here, if you need help with any of that, help with how you want to lead your life and all, I’m here.” Bucky nods gratefully and smiles softly, one that Steve matches verbatim.

He’s not sure why he agrees: whether it’s out of hope or some morbid curiosity. But, he wants to know what being ‘good’ can feel like. He’s felt too long like a stain on other people’s lives. What will happen if he just tries to…he doesn’t know, be _good_ , in the truly traditional version of the word.

“God,” Bucky chokes out with a laugh, “you have to be an angel. Seriously, I still don’t believe you’re all that real. Am _I_ dead?”

Steve chuckles. “I don’t think so, no.”

“Huh.”

Silence falls, deadly and calm, leaving them with painfully goofy smiles which slowly fade into awkward grimaces. The silence goes on painfully, both of them glancing at each other from the corners of their eyes, unsure whether to part or to stay or to begin what they’ve promised or just…

“Bucky! Get outta that room! Seein’ as you haven’t bothered leaving bed all day we thought we might get you out! Get down here in fifteen minutes! And,” Dugan rushes to say, “say hi to the boyfriend!” Steve huffs a laugh at Dugan’s booming voice but when he sees Bucky, muscles tense, eyes shut, his whole demeanour fades into one that Bucky has never seen before. Soft eyes turn brittle, blue turns to ice and suddenly he looks like a soldier heading into battle - almost unfitting for a man that died before the war he could have fought in even began.

“Bucky, are you okay?” Steve asks, his English accent slipping back into place, like its a symptom of his fear or anger or worry or one of the myriad of emotions that flash behind his eyes like rolling thunder before a storm.

“Yeah, yeah, I’m fine,” Bucky breathes, waving a nonchalant hand around in some chaotic mess of a dismissal.

“You’re lying. Why are you-“

“Steve, let’s not- just, not now, okay? Anyway,” Bucky diverts, attempting to lighten his voice, “I think it’s time I know more about you. You must know a hella lot about me now, I think I deserve to know a bit about you too.” Steve frowns but detecting the flittering panic behind Bucky’s blues, he takes a breath and attempts a painful smile - the smile similar to that of a man that has been buried in ice for seventy years and upon waking, finds himself confronted with a joke.

Steve, still struggling to find anything but his name, tries to piece bits together, lacking in almost all vital parts of his life.

_Death at age 16, pneumonia._

_Born 1917._

_Predilection for fights, reason: unknown. Presumably, honourably (or he’d like to think so)._

_Small. Or was._

_Stubborn. Evidently so._

But all the information seems to be drawn from the now. The more he talks to Bucky, the more the traits become apparent, like digging a tunnel towards the light until it’s blinding his fragile eyes. His stubborn, justice-led personality takes forefront.

Bucky, through all of Steve’s musing, tries to remember to be reluctant in believing this all. Steve is a madman, he wants to stand by that. He can’t believe that this man is from the forties, or dead or…anything.

Somehow, it’s easier to see this man as an angel. Never living. Just a man from heaven that doesn’t have a story at all, no past, no history, just sent down from heaven. But no, as Steve tries to piece things together aloud, Bucky realises that this man can’t be a man without a past. The details are too specific, the stories too like real memories, fragmented but with all the specifics of a storyteller.

“Look,” Bucky says when Steve’s small monologue comes to an end, “this is all a little…unbelievable. But!” He interrupts when Steve tries to get a word in edgeways, “I’ve only really got one option. And I’m gonna believe you. But if this is gonna work, we’re gonna make this double sided. You can teach me…morality or whatever you’re trying to help me with and I’m gonna help you piece your life together, try and figure out who you were and what happened. We’ll find a death certificate, we’ll try get your memories to surface and in the meanwhile, I can show you around the future a bit. Sound like a deal? One life pieced together for another’s to be too.”

“I think it does,” Steve affirms. Bucky smiles and stands, brushing the phantom dust from his jeans and motions for the door. “I think I’ve gotta go out in,” he checks his watch “three minutes ago so its probably best that you get out before my friends storm in. They should be in the living room so if you run quick enough, they won’t see you.” Steve nods, striding purposefully to the door, gripping the doorknob with more vigour than he meant to and then it just…shatters.

“Holy shit,” Bucky breathes and Steve watches the fake gold crumble from his hands. In a fit of panic, he looks back and forth between his hand, Bucky and the tumbling piece of metal. And it’s not the shattering that’s surprising either of them. Steve’s hand…it’s….it’s… _glowing_.

“You’re….you’re…” Bucky tries, mindlessly pointing at the golden glow hovering over Steve’s palms.

“I…I didn’t know this would happen. I think this is- I think death has given me a lot more than I thought it would.” Steve brings his hand away, clutching it protectively before examining the glow with careful eyes. The glow…it’s familiar, it’s-

“Buck. I’m gonna go now but just…don’t be surprised. I promise I’ll be back soon. I’ll see ya around.” Bucky nods - it’s not as if he has anything else to do - and watches as Steve reaches for something he can’t see - an ethereal glow, a square, something beautiful - and just…vanishes.

Bucky tries to swallow the shock, his mouth hanging open (probably catching a few flies) and his whole body trembling with a newfound anxiety that he can’t seem to displace.

And with Steve’s exit, Bucky’s alone, left with the thoughts of angels on his mind, the thought of his troubles flittering far, far away and the hope for better days staining his tarnished skin with only a trembling in his bones to assure that today happened at all.


	4. Twin Rivers

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm hoping to finally have an update schedule for this! So far, this is being updated a month after the last one but I'm hoping for better than that. At this rate, I'm going to aim for every other Saturday. Thank you all so much for reading and I hope you enjoy!

 

**JAMES (BUCKY) BARNES - MANCHESTER, ENGLAND**

[Bucky](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6ec6Q67fd2U) waits a week. Then he waits a month. And then he waits another. In total he waits _two fucking months_ before he sees any sign of Steve. In this time he has convinced himself of many things, namely:

  1. Steve Rogers never fucking existed an he’s an idiot for thinking so.
  2. Not killing himself was one of the worst fucking decisions of his life.
  3. Life fucking _sucks_.
  4. Friends are shitty (although he’d like to think he already knew that).
  5. DON’T TRUST PEOPLE WHO APPEAR IN YOUR BATHROOM SAYING THEY WANT TO HELP: **STRANGER DANGER, STRANGER DANGER, STRANGER DANGER!**



He comes to the likely conclusion that, on that fated day, that he had hallucinated the whole fucking thing. Admittedly, it’s not like his mind state was in a good place and it would be no surprise if he had hallucinated it all but…

…there was something that had felt so _real_ about it all and to think it was all just…fake is something a little too painful for Bucky to swallow (almost like those _fucking_ pills).

There may be one thing that he’s gotten out of the night nevertheless. Namely, a purpose. He wants to know what the hell happened: for better or for worse. If he had hallucinated, he’d like to know why because he’s pretty sure that’s not something that happens regularly to most people - and definitely not in such vivid detail, anyway. If he didn’t, if that was _real_ , he wants to know two very different things.

One, who Steve is.

Two, where the fuck did the go?

It is not all that surprising what his depression-inducing two months of moping has done. He tries to keep a bright face, he might even be succeeding. It’s no surprise to his friends when his face occasionally falls; that’s natural, or maybe it’s just a Bucky thing (it might just be a Bucky thing). But only a week after ‘the event’, as he simply names it, his body has already fallen into detriment.

Most mornings, Bucky wakes up, face buried into the pillow, begging to be pulled into the abyss of sleep. And he’s-

Numb.

So fucking numb. He can feel the drum of his heartbeat in his chest, the pounding palpitations that are nothing more than a giant _FUCK YOU!_ to his body for living. His head hurts but he doesn’t dare address the pain, doesn’t think he deserves to, simply lets is pulse in his cranium until its cracking apart. His whole body heaves upwards, propelled by the force that it takes to wake him up. His mind screams at him to fall back down, tripping him up like it always does. He second guesses his decision when the pulsing in his head turns into raging punches, smashing through his skull, opening up the fragile cracks into chasms. In a delirium of pain, he stumbles into the bathroom, legs scrambling as they crumble beneath him. The world swings on its axis, throwing him to his side as blood rushes to his head. Stopping, he waits to catch his breath and for his head to calm into the usual painful knocking that indicates that the stress hasn’t gone yet.

He’d need to sort his life out for that.

Finally, finding himself in the bathroom, eyes bloodshot and head still spinning, he grips the sink and stares at himself in the mirror; blue eyes dulled by exhaustion, brown hair - long and tangled - framing his face like a crooked frame, body sallow and thin; mouth downturned; eyes surrounded by black, deathly. Bucky stares at himself and…

Well,

Smiles. He smiles so _fucking_ bright. Until he’s grinning, beaming like the room has just turned to money and he knows his life is on the up. Beaming like he’s actually happy. Beaming like nothing, absolutely nothing, can stop him.

And then he lets it fall. Then brings it back. Then lets it fall. Perfect, just as practice always makes it. Slipping a neutral - but bright - look onto his face, he allows himself the benefit of the doubt and pretends he looks good. He combs his hair, pulls it back into a man bun - just like all the ‘cool kids’ these days - and forces the smile into place again.

The routine happens every day. It happens today. And tomorrow. And the next, and the next and-

Bucky wakes up, face buried in his pillow, begging to be pulled into the abyss of sleep. And he’s-

Numb.

You get the point.

It’s on the two month anniversary of the not-quite-so-death-inducing-as-he-would-have-liked suicide attempt (if you asked him honestly, and he replied just as truthfully, you would know that he regrets what he did. He’s glad to be alive; he’s glad that someone saved him. He just doesn’t want to give Steve the gratification) when Bucky decides that he’s going to celebrate this whole ‘being alive’ thing.

In his dictionary, celebrate means a lot of things. If it were up to him, he’d probably play a funny board game with his friends, maybe have a few beers and just have a laugh - chill but fun, his favourite kind of activities - but when he brings up the idea to his friends, they all start to scream (okay, they don’t _really_ start screaming but they might as well).

“Oh my god! Perfect timing. You know that guy, the art major guy, he says that there’s this rave going on in the city centre and it’s gonna be fucking lit. Come with.” A rave is definitely _not_ what Bucky had implied but it’s too late now and Bucky doesn’t ever have the willpower to say that he’s not up for anything (for fear of looking boring, mundane or any plethora of synonyms) so that’s his plans for the night: a rave (whoop!). It’s not as if he knows what to say if he _was_ going to fight them.

By now, he knows that he’s stuck in the perpetual loop of anxiety: can’t say no, afraid to say yes. But the conversation’s have gotten so old, so repetitive, that he can’t begin to face the impossibility of saying no. So, here he is, stuck going to rave, with little to no enthusiasm and little to no money to pay whatever fees you have to pay to go to a rave (what? Bucky’s never been to a rave before).

And so it happens. It’s pretty much exactly what Bucky expects: flashing lights, pounding music, bones beating out his body. Fine, if he’s honest. Not the worst thing he’s been too. A little dull. Even more so as the night drags out and he loses more and more interest whilst his friends get more and more drunk. He tries to have a beer but it sits funny on his tongue. He tries another, ignoring the churning in his stomach until he’s sitting in a toilet stall - muck everywhere, graffiti streaming over the walls and door, lights flickering above his head - head in his hands whilst music pounds outside the door fighting to get in but never getting that, bar a humming thrum that flickers under the door.

By the end of the night, he feels nothing but whining in his ears and the palpitations of his heart, his skin feeling like it’s been peeled off and replaced. His emotions are askew until he doesn’t feel any of them at all. His friends laugh raucously in the taxi whilst he stares distantly out the window, assuring them with a “I’m fine, I’m fine! Stop asking. ‘M just tired.” It works.

It always works.

The taxi rolls on, the lull of conversation waxing and waning in the background. Bucky stares steadfastly out the window, eyes half way to closed, trying to draw out a smile onto his face. If anything, even if this night has been a nightmare (or a pointless effort, anyway), even if he feels like his friends are laughing at him not with him, what’s outside the window is beautiful. Manchester, half way between industrious and beautiful, has never looked so beautiful; sobered-drunk eyes awe at the dancing lights on the cracked pavement as the washed out images run past him. The bleakness of it all begs for someone to see, to look beyond the shadows and to revel in the flashing lights as red turns to green and orange turns to black, shadows passing between each light, each light illuminated between each shadow. Bucky smiles, as strongly as he ever can these days, and lets his lips curve gently as the world passes him by: passes little old insignificant him by. This, he thinks, is what he’d like to do. Maybe behind the wheel himself this time and just allowing himself to…breathe. Witnessing the cold reality of the night from the safety of his car, watching as the darkness comes out to play, threatening its inhabitants with horror stories and weaving terror.

With his mind lost to the clouds, time wins and the taxi startles to a halt. The group bustles out, shoulders jolting shoulders, large grins and grabbing hands attacking Bucky with nothing more than kindness. Bucky tries to capture the beauty again, looking desperately for purchase but as he looks around, it’s all too familiar, the voices too loud. He needs to be alone…he just needs to be fucking alone.

“Bucky!” Dugan shouts as Bucky jostles past them, head bowed, frown marring his features. “Where you goin’?” Bucky looks back, sadness in his eyes, hidden behind layers of practice (so much fucking practice) even when he tries to show it, even when he’s desperate for them to see it-

He can’t be bothered to fight, can’t be bothered with this conversation, can’t muster the fucking fight. He keeps his lips sealed and stalks silently back to his room, mind as numb as his faintly inebriated body.

In the darkness of his room, shadows playing tenaciously on the walls, light flickering through cheap curtains, he throws himself down onto his bed, placing a floppy arm over his eyes and breathes in a heaving sigh, too lazy to lean over and turn on the bedside light.

He lays there for hours, half way between dozing and sleeping until his alarm goes off and the morning rolls over the sky, bright yellow barraging through the thin cotton of his curtains. He wakes up to black, his arm still thrown over his eyes and feels the mindless agony in his head that you feel when you haven’t really slept at all.

It’s still early he notes. There’s still enough time to sleep-

“Fuck it,” he breathes, throwing his arm off his eyes and staring mindlessly at the ceiling. “Fuck it,” he repeats, so quiet that the faint tick of his clock still clicks louder. “If you are there, God, or whoever the fuck you are, can you send Steve back? He really was…he helped me and I just wanna know if he’s real and I know I’m not really a person whose earned it or anything but-“

“Buck?”

“Steve?”

“Hey-“

“You _asshole_ ,” Bucky spits, flying off the bed with the power of a super soldier, body tense, eyes slitted, not stopping for a beat. “You fucking _asshole_. You know how long it’s been?” The pause that’s only there for dramatic effect is filled by a faint “it’s only been-“

“Two _fucking_ months! Two months! You know how fucking long that is? I didn’t know if you were fucking real or whether I’m just as crazy a lunatic as I think I am. And then you have the _audacity_ to come back-“

“Bucky,” Steve cuts him off with a frown, that deeply unsettling face that Bucky hates so much fixed into place. “Don’t attack me for something I couldn’t help.” Bucky takes a moments pause, lets his features cool and stares curiously at Steve. “Thank you,” Steve thanks. For what, Bucky doesn’t really know but it’s probably for the silence, something that even Bucky thinks he’s grateful for (especially when he has to try and explain this in the morning). Steve waits, and waits, until Bucky’s finally lost the tension in his shoulders and is looking faintly guilty for his outburst.

“Bucky, look, for me it’s only been…I don’t know. Time doesn’t work the same way over there as it does here. For me it barely felt like a few minutes, maybe a few hours. I’m sorry that you had to wait. And anyway, I still can’t…can’t find the mechanics for this all so please bear with me. I just heard your voice and ran straight through. I’m not sure if I even can get to you if you don’t ask,” Steve sighs, anxiety crippling the stability of his words. He sounds…off kilter, like he’s come back from a stressful job with nothing more than a person to calm him down. Bucky doesn’t think he can deal with dependency like that.

He hopes he’s wrong.

He’s always wrong, he tells himself. It’ll be fine.

Bucky, despite the explanation, still feels the faint buzz of resentment in his veins, can feel his body itching for a fight but he quells it down with a nod. “Okay but we’re going to have to be careful with this. I’m not doing that again-“ Steve must notice the panic in Bucky’s eyes because he’s quick to become a mediator in his own fight and plants a firm hand on Bucky’s shoulder, pressing down evidently harder than he’s meant to. “And you shouldn’t. No one should. And I won’t let that happen again. I’m sorry it’s been so long. I promised to help and although I haven’t been here recently, I’m here now. And all I want to do it help.” Bucky can feel the anger dissipate from him by the second. “We’re both young, I think we’re allowed to make a few mistakes.” Bucky looks up at Steve’s, eyes glistening with hope and feels a pull in his chest. It’s realisation he, ironically, realises. Steve’s young too. If anything, he’s younger. It’s not Steve that’s dependent on Bucky at all: that was a stupid assumption. It’s Bucky that’s the dependent one. And it needs to stop. They’re young, they’re not made for this sort of co-dependency, this sort of…tie. No matter how desperate Bucky is for it (enough, at least, that he trusts an insane man in his bedroom claiming to be an angel). “I know you’re angry but can we resolve this now?”

Bucky nods. “I’m okay now.”

“Thank you.”

“There’s nothing to thank.”

“Of course there is,” Steve replies with a soft smile.

“You can let go of my shoulder now.”

“Oh! Of course, of course,” Steve fumbles, taking his hand back like it’s burning. Silence falls like the sun rises on the horizon as the clock ticks on, racing towards morning. Bucky breaks away from Steve, falling onto the bed, eyes blank and lost, staring at the blue-stained floor like it will save him from his own inability. Steve goes to sit next to him, hand reaching down to the small bed post to lever himself, stopping just at the moment that it crumbles in his hand.

“Oh. Sorry?” He tries, looking up at Bucky. Bucky just sighs, rubbing an irritated hand over his face; why had he called for Steve again?

“I really think we need to figure out what the hell that is.” Steve stares down at his hand, eyebrows furrowed, his voice steeled as he replies “yeah, we do.” As Bucky spots the look of consternation on Steve’s face, he’s quick to butt in. “Look, it’s fine, we just need to look into it, that’s all. You have any idea what it is?”

“No,” Steve’s quick to respond. “This whole…thing, I don’t know, it’s unexpected. I don’t even know what I look like. I mean, I know what I used to look like but-“ Bucky shoots to his feet, cutting Steve off. “Come on, follow me, I have a full length mirror in the bathroom.” Steve follows, body tense, and looks around the bathroom with avid curiosity.

Bucky pushes the door open, holding it open, allowing Steve in first before leading him to the left side where a crooked old mirror stands, angled to Bucky’s height, wooden frame crumbling at the edges. Steve steps forward cautiously, mind spurring wild thoughts: what he will look like, what he might have become, how he might have changed.

He steps forward, lets his eyes drag from the wall to the mirror and just…looks. And, well, he looks- different. Taller, wider. He can see now what he used to look like with unsettling clarity: small frame, gaunt cheeks, those knobbly knees that used to be his sole sight from his hospital bed. “I look different,” Steve states, face neutral, almost stern looking - just like it always used to look - but a faint manic glow in his eyes, a pulse of panic behind the facade of this ‘strong man’.

“How so?”

“Used to be smaller. Skinnier. Too skinny. Really ill too. Looked about ten when I was turning sixteen when I…”

“Died?”

“Yeah.”

“Sorry.”

“Nothing to be sorry about it.”

“I shouldn’t have brought it up,” Bucky argues but Steve is having none of it; he turns abruptly, face truly stern and says “don’t be afraid to say anything if it’s not actively hurting someone. I’m here, aren’t I? My death shouldn’t scare me because in a way, I survived it. If you have something to say, say it. You should only censor yourself if you think there is a valid, important reason to do so. America is founded on free speech, don’t be afraid to speak.”

Bucky is shocked into silence, his mouth stuttering for words until he stumbles upon “but isn’t hurting your feelings a valid reason to not say anything?”

“Not really,” Steve shrugs. “I mean, of course, you shouldn’t actively try to hurt someone but if you are doing something out of curiosity, a basic human thought, then why should you censor yourself. You weren’t trying to hurt me, you were satisfying a need. I see nothing wrong with that. If I’d said that you shouldn’t have said that, there would be a different problem because then repeating it would be actively mean. You were doing neither of us any harm.”

“But-“

“That’s just how I see it, Bucky, and I’m sorry if I’m not phrasing it in a way that makes you understand but let’s just start with this: if you want to ask me something, or say anything, just do it. I will tell you if I don’t want you to broach something further.” Bucky nods. “Good. Now,” he says, turning back to the mirror, “I think it’s time that I figure out this body.”

“Wha-“ Bucky tries to interject but Steve has already strolled past him. Steve takes in a large breath, shaking out his arms and little and holding his head high before turning back to Bucky. “If I’m going to help you, I need to make sure I know what’s going on with my own body.”

“Is it that important?”

“Of course,” Steve replies instantaneously. “How am I supposed to help you if I feel uncomfortable in my own body. That’s no help to anyone.”

“Okay. I guess. We can try a few things.”

“Thank you,” Steve replies sincerely. Steve pauses, looking down at his overgrown body and wonders where the hell he is supposed to start. He can feel the thrum of power under his skin, can feel that there’s something clawing to get out. He knows he can crush something without meaning to, he knows his strength is beyond men. He thinks back to Meloda, and what she’d said about Zeus. In the legends, he had more than just super strength, he had…well, depending on the story, almost unlimited power.

Steve stares at his hands, trying to let the power flood to the surface, pictures is as water, then fire, then the earth under his feet but he feels nothing but the clawing desperation. “I’m not sure where to start,” he admits, his eyes still trained on the faint callouses in his hand, a symbol that at least something had translated from his old body.

“Well, we know you can crush things. How about we start with that?”

“I don’t want to break any of your things. I’ve already done enough damage.”

“Pfft,” Bucky deflects, “I don’t care. I’ll find something for you to break. It’ll be fun.”

“Somehow, I feel like you’re concocting a plan.”

“Oooh, concocting, fancy word. We’re getting serious here. Anyway, try this,” Bucky says, holding out a wooden block.

“What…why do you have this?”

Bucky shrugs. “Don’t question the things in a students room.”

“Okay?”

“Come on, get on with it. I want to see you rip it in half.”

“You’re enjoying this far too much,” Steve sighs, smiling, shaking his head gently

“Sure I am. Now get on with it, Rogers,” Bucky urges, any previous anger or confusion forgotten in light of a new discovery, flailing a hand manically at the block - of which the origins are still unknown - jumping down excitedly on the balls of his feet like a child waiting for their birthday cake.

“Fine, fine.” Steve feels the block in his hand, clutching it in a fist before just squeezing. The thing splinters entirely.

“Never mind in half, you frickin’ tore that to shreds!”

“Sorry?”

“Oh no, don’t apologise for this. This is, frankly, awesome.”

“I feel like you should be a little more worried that I can crush something by just…squeezing.”

“Eh, I’ve seen worse,” Bucky offers, rummaging through his meagre belongings to find another thing that can be snapped.

“What could be worse?”

“Don’t worry about it,” Bucky deflects, waving a flailing hand dismissively.

“You know, when I was younger, materials were a lot more important,” Steve complains when he’s handed a thick wad of paper, maybe just less than a ream and told to rip it in half.

“It’s some paper, Rogers, get on with it.”

“Back then, even paper had to be saved. Materials were important. And scarce.” Bucky’s attention is suddenly off the paper, his face settled in a frown. “Sorry, pal, but a lot’s changed since the forties.”

“Apparently saying pal hasn’t.”

“Oh, it has. I just like saying it.” Bucky doesn’t add that its because every time he does, Steve’s face just lights up a little. “Come on, get on with it. And while your at it, tell me a bit more about this mysterious pastime you grew up in.” Bucky doesn’t even really mean to say it but when the smile lights up on Steve’s face, he’s glad he did. Steve, almost immediately, begins to churn out information about growing up: about poverty, about family, about friends (albeit a lack of them). Bucky listens intently, almost missing the moment where Steve tears the wad in half with little more than a passing thought.

“No way! You saw _Snow White_ when it first came out. You gotta be kidding me. You’re _old_.”

“Have we not established that already?”

“Oh shut up,” Bucky retorts, slapping Steve on the arm with the back of his hand and then…

“SHIT!”

“Woah,” Steve says, holding his hands up in surrender as Bucky cradles his hand like a new born, blinking away the tears in his eyes. “What the fuck was that?” Bucky asks, dejectedly shuffling his fingers about until they’re able to move with _almost_ normal mobility.

“I don’t know. Try again.”

“Try again?! Are you trying to get me killed. That _hurt_.”

“Okay, okay! Just, I don’t know, tap me or something.”

“I’ve _touched_ you before, Steve, I don’t think that’s the same thing.”

“I don’t know! Flick me, that shouldn’t hurt, right?”

Bucky huffs. “Fine, but if I break my fingers, that’s on you.”

“Totally,” Steve replies with what Bucky thinks might be a bit too honest (Bucky might need to hold off on the passing remarks, he feels like Steve is taking them a little seriously). Bucky takes in a breath, holds up the other, non-crippled, hand and flicks Steve.

“Holy. Shit.”

“You’re very into the whole…swearing thing today, aren’t you.”

“Oh, stop being an old man. That is so cool!”

“Cool?”

“Yeah, cool.”

“What?”

“Oh, I mean it’s awesome. Not cold. That’s not what cool means anymore.”

“Oh.”

“Yeah, anyway,” Bucky continues, in hopes of breaking the awkward tension fizzling between them, “did you not see that?”

“See what.”

“Okay, no, look. Look where I flick you.” Bucky pulls back again, gently flicking at Steve’s bicep and just at the moment of contact, a shimmering gold barrier floods over his skin, fading almost as quickly as it appears (like when a demon hits the barriers of Wakanda).

“Oh…wow.”

“I know right! It’s amazing. That must protect you. So that means you don’t just have super strength but super defence too!”

“This is turning into a pulp novel.”

“Oh shush, Rogers, this is cool.”

“And entirely impossible.”

“ _I’m_ the one whose supposed to be sceptical so stop complaining. You’re the ones with the power who just randomly appears out of thin air. Oh! Add that: teleportation.”

“I don’t think it’s tele-“ Steve tries to interrupt but Bucky has already got a flow going.

“Okay, so. Next thing on the list. What else is generic-“

“Hey!”

“Stop complaining, it’s true,” Steve wants to interject and prove Bucky wrong but when Bucky has the smile on his face, Steve knows he means nothing by it. “So, super strength, super defence, teleportation…how about pain?”

“Um…how are we going to test that?” Steve asks, suddenly worried.

“Pinch yourself.”

“Really?”

“Yeah. Do it, Rogers. In the name of science.”

“Um, okay?” Steve holds his flesh between his two fingers and squeezes as hard as he can. He doesn’t even feel a thing, even when bruises blossom on his skin, even if they heal a second later.

“Shit, stop, you’re hurting yourself!” Bucky interjects, snatching Steve’s fingers from his skin.

“I can’t feel anything.”

“Really?”

“Yeah, feels the same as just holding the skin.”

“Oh…”

“Another thing to add to the list.”

“Definitely! Now, anything else you think could happen?” Steve examines himself, tracing over his fingers and realising that the pull of the power under his skin has faded, less urgent, like making its presence known has been enough. “I don’t think so. That seems like a bit much anyway.”

“Oh stop with the unrealistic nonsense. It’s happening, right? And maybe this is all just one big hallucination but I’d rather think it’s not, okay?” Bucky replies, a little frantic.

“Okay, okay. Calm down. I’m real,” Steve comforts, holding Bucky’s arm his grip, gently coaxing him into calm by rubbing his thumb up and down the prominent vein on the side of it. “Stop worrying. I can hear your mind buzzing.”

“Okay. I’m fine,” Bucky tries but it sounds false to even himself. He looks up at Steve, blue eyes still slightly widened with panic. “I just…I can’t believe this is real. All this…angel stuff. It just seems impossible.”

“I thought I was the sceptic here.”

“I know, it’s just…you’re an _angel_ , I’m allowed to be confused.”

“I’m not sure I’m an angel.”

“I am,” Bucky replies with such surety, he surprises himself.

“Okay then, if that’s how you see me.” Bucky smiles, looking up at Steve but as his eyes get higher, they continue to go even higher, up until they rest a fair distance away from the top of Steve’s head. “Oh it really is.” Bucky’s smiling and much to Steve’s dismay, he has to say that Bucky’s smiling _too_ much. That sort of smile that someone gets when they know a secret and isn’t telling.

“What is it?”

“I don’t think you want to know.”

“I do.”

“You really don’t.”

“Just tell me, Bucky.”

“Okay, sure, but you’re gonna hate it.”

“I won’t _hate_ it-“

“You have a _halo_.”

“I…what?!” Steve stumbles frantically over his words, his eyes darting up to try and see what’s above his head.

“You’re not gonna be able to see it, silly. It’s above you. It moves with your head.”

“I think you’re lying,” Steve retorts stubbornly.

Bucky begins to laugh. “I’m really not. I mean, I would take a picture but I have a feeling my phone’s camera won’t pick this up.”

“You’re lying.”

“I’m not,” Bucky laughs, reaching up above Steve’s head, letting his hand rest on the thin gold band above Steve’s head. Steve gasps, “I can feel that…”

“See, not lying.”

“That’s stupid.”

“It really is,” Bucky laughs, trying to hold it in but his shoulders are shaking too much.

“But that’s pointless! What would I need a halo for!”

“Angel stuff.”

“What angel stuff! Why is it even there? Was it always there?”

“No,” Bucky chuckles, his shoulders beginning to tremble rather than shake. “They just appeared.”

Steve focuses, already determined, imagining the stupid halo away. “Hey!” Bucky complains, “bring it back!”

“Why would I? It’s pointless.”

“It’s funny!”

“Exactly!” Bucky begins to crack up, holding his stomach in his hand, feeling the frantic protrusions. “Oh my god, that’s so stupid.”

“It’s never coming back.”

“Oh it will.”

“Oh it won’t.”

“It will.”

“It won’t.”

“Bucky!” Dugan shouts as he storms in, the rest of the gang crowded around him. “Oh.” He stares dumbly at Steve and Bucky, who are almost chest to chest, too close to even claim the ‘just friends’ (even if they are, _they are_ , no, seriously! They are!) “I’m just gonna…um, I’m gonna go. Tell me when you guys are…” he shuffles out the door “decent!” The door slams and Bucky’s left mortified, staring at Steve like he might just get attacked.

“Decent?” Steve asks. Bucky latches quickly onto the confusion and says, “oh, don’t worry about it. It’s just a joke they like to make. They find it funny.”

“Oh.” Steve isn’t any less confused. Nevertheless, he spots Bucky’s unwillingness and sits down on the bed, looking up at Bucky with soft eyes. In an attempt to change the topic, and upon seeing the flare of sorrow across Bucky’s eyes, he asks, “how are you, Buck? I haven’t asked you yet.”

“Fine,” he retorts immediately - too immediately.

“That’s not true.”

“What’s it to you?” Bucky argues defensively, arms crossed across his chest.

“I care.” The answer throws Bucky off his ground, his mind frantically scrambling for purchase but landing on nothing but a small smile and faint embarrassment.

“I’m sorry,” Bucky sighs, his whole body in whiplash at the constant turn of emotions; Steve really needs to just let him…slow down. This whole thing is a lot to process.

“Don’t be-“

“It’s just,” Bucky continues, like there was never an interruption at all, “been hard without you. God, that sounds cheesy,” he hisses, head flung back, eyes staring for the answer in the cracks of the ceiling. “I dunno. I just haven’t been…myself.”

“Since I first came or…before.”

“Before, I think. I dunno. I never track it. I just tend to lose time. A lot of it. I may still be faintly annoyed that you didn’t fucking show up for two months but if I’m honest, I can’t think of a single thing I’ve done in the last two months. I’ve gone to my lectures, to tutor, but I haven’t…I haven’t learnt a thing. I’m just, I dunno, there.”

“You’re doing sports, right?” Steve still feels a little odd about the topic. No one ‘studied’ sports in his day. Or he can’t think of any, at least. People played, people practiced, but they didn’t study it.

“Yeah.” Steve pauses for a moment, mulling over an idea. “Tell me about it.”

“I told you, I haven’t learnt a thing. It’s not like I can tell you any-“

“Just try. It might help.” And it does, it _fucking does_ (Bucky may be a bit bitter about that fact). He starts to speak and suddenly it’s all kinda flowing out. Two years worth of learning spilling from his lips. Not perfect, not in any way, nothing worth putting in an essay but the basic knowledge is still there. He knows his subject. His confidence grows as Steve smiles, listening intently to the information pouring out Bucky’s mouth. Suddenly, Bucky is talking with _excitement_ , arms waving as he portrays techniques and muscle groups, smiling all the way through. And then-

“Oh good! You’re decent. Hi random dude, I’m Dugan. Anyway, another party tonight. You’re coming, you’ll love it: 80s theme. All gay dudes love that, right?” Bucky doesn’t even answer when Dugan hurriedly adds “great! I’ll see you there. Feel free to invite random boyfriend with you!” He rushes out, humming an out of tune song as he goes, leaving Bucky, still half way into an animation, standing frozen, eyes betrayed and muscles tense.

“You okay?” Steve asks gently. Bucky’s eyes dart to Steve, like a deer caught in the headlights, his mouth opening and closing before he settles on a choked out “no.”

“Why not,” Steve says, turning suddenly, worry encasing him. “Do you not want to go the party?”

“No, no, I mean yes, but it’s not that.”

“What is it?”

“You mean you don’t care?”

“Care about what, Buck. You’re confusing me.”

“I’m…gay.”

“Gay?”

“Oh for fuck sake! Gay! Queer! Homosexual! I like _fucking_ men.”

“Oh…”

“Yeah, oh.” Bucky paces back and forth a few times, panic turning to fear which in a blink of an eye, turns to rage. “I’m going to fucking _kill_ him!” Bucky screams, kicking at the bed post, ignoring the rush of pain through his body. He’s just so fucking…ARGH! He finally had something-

He finally had _something_ , anything. Steve was…a fucking light at the end of the tunnel. Some fucking hope. But this guy is from the forties, what hope does he have if he knows he’s…knows he’s…

Wrong in the head.

“Buck. Buck! Stop! STOP!” Steve shouts, as Bucky rampages through the room, knocking his meagre belongings out of place, a few meaningless books clattering onto the floor whilst pens rattle in their places. “Stop, please.” Bucky takes a breath, shutting his eyes and trying to push the rage to one side. “Just go now, Steve. If you’re gonna. I can’t be fucking assed to deal with this.”

“Buck, stop. I’m not going to leave.”

“You say that now,” Bucky bites, collapsing onto the bed, elbows resting on his knees, head held in the cups of his hands.

“No, Buck. I’m staying,” Steve assures, crouching down in front of Bucky and holding his forearms in his over-sized hands. “Why do you think I would leave?”

“I’m…I like men. What do you even call it?”

“Queer, mostly. Fairy, sometimes.”

“Well I’m queer. You gonna try and call the police? ‘Cuz that don’t happen anymore. It’s fucking legal but if you’re gonna be uncomfortable with it, you better leave.”

“I’m not gonna leave.”

“Stop lying! I ain’t making you stick around if you’re gonna feel uncomfortable around me.”

“I won’t.”

Bucky pauses, at a loss for words, finding no valid arguments to throw back at Steve. He looks up, eyes watering - he hadn’t even realised it until now - and takes in a shuddering breath. “You won’t?”

“No, Buck. Being queer ain’t so bad.” Steve isn’t even sure but Buck…he’s a good person, Steve’s sure of that. Heaven or hell - whether they exist or not - don’t mean anything. Bucky’s a good guy, he really is. Being queer isn’t going to change that.

Steve tells himself that anyway. It may take a bit of getting used to. But, it’s nothing new. Steve knows that he passed on of the queer clubs on his way to the grocer’s every day. He saw a few of them. Normal fella’s. Nice ones, too.

“Really?”

“Really.”

“You’re not gonna leave?”

“No.”

“Oh thank god,” Bucky breaths, letting his head fall. It tumbles forward until it’s landed on Steve’s shoulder. Steve, carefully, tugs him into his arms, trying to at least show that he’s not _uncomfortable_ around Bucky. That much he can do.

He gently strokes his hand down Bucky’s back, softly murmuring sweet reassurances in his ear. Bucky relaxes slowly, collapsing into the frame of Steve’s body as he whispers “please don’t go.”

“Never, Buck,” he promises. “Not for something like this.” Steve continues to softly pet his back, loosening his grip as time goes on to allow Bucky to choice to sit on his own again. “How about you get ready for that party? Would that cheer you up?” Bucky shrugs noncommittally, and rests his head in the crook of Steve’s neck, taking a deep, shuddering breath as he tries to compose himself.

“Are you worried about the party?” Bucky shrugs again, not allowing himself the chance to admit to his worst fears. “Buck, you know if you don’t want to go to this, you don’t have to.”

“No,” Bucky whispers into Steve’s shoulder, “no, I’ll go. It’ll be fun.”

“You don’t sound so sure about that, pal.”

“No, seriously,” Bucky continues, pulling back, holding his chest out and his shoulders back, head held too high “it’ll be fun. 80s and everything,” he whispers conspiratorially.

“Don’t know anything ‘bout the 80s but if I’m invited then…”

“Of course you’re invited, dummy, even my friends want you to come,” Bucky laughs, rubbing at his red eyes before gently tapping a slap Steve on the shoulder, careful not to smash his fingers again, trying to ignore the pang in his heart when he thinks of going out tonight.

It’ll be fine, he tells himself.

It’ll be fine.

 

 

The ‘disco’ lights flash garishly in the dark room. It’s someone’s house, Bucky thinks, although it’s hard to tell by the outside alone. Somewhere between a castle and a mansion, this place is _huge_ and even Steve seems a little shocked as to where they end up. Although, all of Bucky’s _other_ friends seem entirely comfortable as they stride towards the entrance, nodding at the doorman (oh my god, _doorman_ ) as they go inside, only causing Bucky to feel worse about this whole thing: how can they be that goddamn comfortable, this is ridiculous.

Of course, they’d been right. This is a true 80s disco, Duran Duran booming through the speakers, followed by a healthy dose of Depeche Mode, whilst the lights settle a hazy purple and blue glow over the dance-floor. Bucky, although somewhat drawn to the cheesy - thought subjectively fantastic (okay, okay, he might be a _little_ of a stereotypical gay) - music, is left to the side, tailed by a very lost looking Steve, choosing - noticeably slowly - which drink to have.

“This is _very_ different to what I expected,” Steve shouts over the music. Bucky huffs a laugh, turning over his shoulder. “It ain’t the forties, that’s for sure. Just try and enjoy yourself. Get a taste of modern life.” Steve looks discernibly fearful of ‘getting a taste of modern life’ but straightens himself and tries ( _tries_ ) to bop to the music. He’s, in the end, fairly unsuccessful.

So is Bucky.

They go through the entire party sober, or at least fairly so (although neither of them for lack of trying). They have to add to the list that Steve is incapable of getting drunk. Or, at least, has one of the highest tolerances ever. The man drank a cup of vodka, thinking it was water (whoever had left it there was an idiot) without even noticing. Bucky, on the other hand, had to stop every time his stomach churned which seemed to be - whether due to anxiety or illness - a lot.

So, the party passes fairly intolerably.

Bucky stares longingly at his ‘fun-enjoying’ friends, stuck on the sidelines, tugging himself away from any proper conversation as his mind screams at him to speak less.

Wait, no - speak more.

Speak less.

No, no, wait-

No, you’re annoying them.

What if they don’t even want to listen to this?

They’re turning away.

Fuck! That means they’re not interested.

They’re-

Fuck it.

He takes himself out of every conversation he’s in.

Steve watches him carefully throughout the night, face set into far too sombre a mask for a party. People are repulsed by the furious energy that surrounds him, slowly growing throughout the night. The music pulsing in his chest only aggravates his irritation; the fear on Bucky’s face only goes to inflate his anger; the sorrow in Bucky’s eyes sends him into a rage.

Steve’s had enough. He tugs a lost looking Bucky by the arm until they hit fresh air, barely a few metres from the doorman, the music still pulsing out the doors. “This is why you feel left out, isn’t it?” Steve spits. “You hate this. Why do you go at all?”

Bucky, as always, relies on defence. “I don’t hate it.”

“Don’t lie to me.”

“Quit getting angry at me! I wasn’t the one who dragged someone outside!”

“Don’t make this about me, Buck. This is about you. Look, I’m giving you an out, are you gonna take it?”

“Not if you keep shouting!”

“I’m just trying to help!”

“Well fat lotta good that’s doing!”

“You want me to leave without you!? Do you want to stick around? Really?” Steve’s voice trails off at the end, leading to barely a whisper as the fight flees him. He’s too tired for this; it’s been a long day, he doesn’t need this from anyone. He’ll help Bucky once Bucky’s in a place to be helped. Shouting at each other isn’t doing anything.

“No.” Bucky deflates, running a hand through his tangled hair and sighing.

“Look, let’s just get home,” Steve offers, taking a step back. Bucky nods and trails after Steve. After a while, he latches onto Steve’s arm, resting his head on the well-built muscle, trying to calm himself down and rid himself of the vague tipsiness he only now notices. Steve is careful with him, like he would be as if Bucky were so drunk he could barely walk, but they make it back in good time.

Bucky pretty much collapses onto his bed, his shoes thrown off to one side, one resting against the wall whilst one lays messily by the door. “You okay now?” Steve asks. Bucky nods, for lack of something better to say. “Look, I’m sorry about earlier I just…I just don’t like seeing you like that. You shouldn’t have to put up with something you don’t want to.”

“I know.”

“Then why do you?” Steve asks softly, sitting down next to a splayed out Bucky, resting a reassuring hand on his shoulder.

“Because I don’t want to miss out.”

“The only thing you’ll be missing out on is a bad time.”

“I know.”

“Please, for me, don’t push yourself into doing more of these things. Have you told your friends that you might want to do something else?”

“They’re not very good listeners.”

“They don’t sound like very good friends.” Bucky shrugs. “Just think about it, okay?”

“Okay.”

“Feeling better?”

“Yeah, punk.”

Steve doesn’t know why it’s so natural to reply, “good, jerk.” Silence falls for a moment before Steve tugs Bucky up again, ignoring the whining sound he makes. “I’m gonna have to go soon but you should get ready for bed.”

“What are you, my mum?” Bucky laughs.

“If that’s what it takes, I will be.” Bucky rolls his eyes but stomps into the bathroom, smiling nonetheless, and starts to brush his teeth, humming gently under his breath, wondering what Steve is doing in the other room.

Steve comes up behind him after a few minutes, smiling. “I think I’ve found something new.” Bucky looks at him through the mirror and watches as Steve gleefully starts to draw shapes, with the same energy that his ‘halo’ was seemingly made out of. His finger darts about, the trail of energy following it.

“Oh my god!” Bucky exclaims, toothbrush hanging out his mouth. “That’s amazing!”

“It’s beautiful,” Steve replies, swishing his hand further. “It alters to what I’m thinking about and…I have a _feeling_ it might have been what made the halo.”

Bucky laughs, spitting out his toothpaste and cleaning up, placing the toothbrush back in the little jar. “So, what? I call you an angel and the first thing you do is give yourself a halo?”

“I didn’t do it!”

“Well, you kinda just admitted that you did.”

“You’re insufferable.”

“Punk.”

“Jerk. Now, go to sleep. I’ll see you soon.”

“But I wanna test this out!”

“Soon. Sleep now.”

“Yes, _mom_ ,” he retorts, placing his American accent on even thicker than usual and collapses into bed. He’s out like a light.

Steve’s not there in the morning. Waking up, his face is buried into the pillow, he wishes to be pulled into the abyss of sleep. And he’s-

Happy.

So fucking _happy_. He can feel the drum of his heartbeat in his chest, the pounding palpitations that are nothing more than a giant congrats to his body for even _living_. His head hurts but he doesn’t bother addressing the pain, knowing it will fade; he simply lets is pulse in his cranium until it has settled down into white noise. His whole body heaves upwards, propelled by the force it takes to wake him up. He second guesses his decision when the pulsing in his head turns to a raging drumbeat, nothing less than suddenly, smashing through his skull, opening up the fragile cracks into chasms. In a delirium of pain, he stumbles into the bathroom, legs scrambling as they crumble beneath him. The world swings on its axis, throwing him to one side as blood rushes to his head - stupid, should have gotten up slower. Stopping, he waits to catch his breath and for his head to calm into an unusually calm sensation that indicates that this just might be a stress free day.

He might have accomplished the first step in sorting his life out.

Finally, standing in the bathroom, eyes clear and head barely spinning, he grips the sink and stares at himself in the mirror. Blue eyes shining with newfound purpose, brown hair - long and tangled - framing his face almost artfully, body only a little on the thin side - he might need to eat a bit more, the exercise required on his course is thinning him down too much. Mouth upturned. Eyes surrounded by a faint purple. Bucky stares at himself and…

Well,

Smiles. He smiles so bright, beaming like the room has just turned to money and he knows his life will be alright. Beaming like he’s actually happy. And then he lets it fall. But it doesn’t fall. It stays. Because it’s real this time.

It’s real.

 


	5. East of Eden

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey guys. A few things to add today. OMG, the Avengers 4 trailer (won't reveal the name for any of those that haven't seen it yet). Amazing. Black Widow was perfect, Steve made my heart break, Tony too. And the ending, it was like an end credits seen. Anyway, onto this again. I'm glad I could get this out before next week making it only just over a week from my last update but I just realised that the next chapter may be much longer and is not fully plotted yet so it may take longer to come out. But, I'm going away for a while and I should have plenty of time to write so hopefully it will not be *too* long. Thank you for sticking with this. Enjoy!
> 
> [side note: still not too happy with the second half of this chapter so at some point, alterations might be made but it shouldn't affect the plot at all]

 

**_STEVE ROGERS - THE GLOW_ **

_“[Steve](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bex9bA7oQwA), you shouldn’t be doing this, it’s not going to-“_

_“Don’t tell me what’s good for me! I’m helping him, can’t you see that?”_

_“Of course I can but it’s only going to end in the worst.”_

_“That isn’t your decision to make!”_

 

 

_**BUCKY BARNES - HOME** _

Freshly washed feet, still rosy red from hot water, press gently into the soft carpet. He rests on his back, humming to a sweet tune coming from the cheap old vinyl player he’d found at the local market. He wishes, if only for a second, that Steve were here with him, laying on the floor, staring mindlessly at the ceiling, mind surprisingly clear, heart beating healthily in his chest. If he’s honest, the man really ought to get back soon and finish what he started. This whole helping Bucky thing is cute and all but he’s not really all that present to do it.

Bucky hasn’t yet resorted to ‘prayer’ (or some alternative that he’d much rather call it), willing to wait and see if Steve can make it on his own but it’s been two weeks since, devoid entirely of partying, and Bucky is starting to get impatient. He’s been more studious than ever before and he can’t wait to show off to Steve that for once, _once_ , he’s listening, paying attention, and enjoying his subject. He remembers now more than ever why he chose it at all.

Of course, it can still be mind numbingly dull.

Still, he regrets his decision.

Still, he had a down period midweek.

But, despite it all, he’s retained an average ‘fairly okay’ mood which is as much as you can expect from someone who’d been willing to pop a few pills and off themselves a few months ago.

Bucky’d rather not think of it anymore. Rather forget that he had been so stupid as to even try. He thinks that might be the first step in recovery.

Although, sometimes, he wonders if he was really going to do it at all.

The record continues to spin inwards, shifting on to next crackly song…

_’-record spins down the alley late night_

_be my friend, surround me like a satellite-‘_

…and he just lets himself listen, breathing deeply and keeps the careful mindfulness he’s been attempting at, if just to…calm down. With his mind so quiet, he finds himself, fairly accidentally, drifting to Steve.

Fuck, he thinks, he’s actually met an angel. How crazy is that?! Stupid, really. Entirely unrealistic.

A fantasy.

A fucking beautiful fantasy.

Trying to shake himself out of it (as soon as his mind starts to drift down from Steve’s face to his chest), he groans and sits up, resting his head against the wall, leaning his head on the edge of the doorframe, the door forcibly shut - an attempt at a fairly open _fuck off_ to his friends. He hasn’t really talked to them all week. He doesn’t really want to.

They’re worried.

He doesn’t really care.

He scrambles for the closest book and opens it up on the latest marked page, skimming through the chapter until he falls on something he needs to go over. Fumbling for a pencil, he begins to scratch markings into the old textbook, drawing notes down the side, barely visible over the old, rubbed-out workings.

It’s a mind numbing exercise but useful nonetheless but he still finds himself drifting more often than not. He’s barely half way down the third page when he realises that his mind has drifted to Steve again. (This needs to stop. Soon enough, he’ll be developing a crush. Is developing- NOPE! Let’s not do that right now). “Fuck, Steve, it’s easier when you’re here.”

“I am.”

“HOLY SHIT!” Bucky starts, his book flying off his lap as the pencil nearly lodges itself in the opposite wall, clattering to the floor with a deathly loud thud.

“Wha- wha- what- what…WHAT?!”

“Um, hello?”

“Fuck’s sake, Steve! Next time, try not to scare the shit outta me.”

“I didn’t mean to?”

“Of course you didn’t,” Bucky complains, letting his head fall back against the wall with a loud thud, wincing but refusing to show any other signs of pain in hopes that he doesn’t look like even more of an idiot. “Holy shit,” he breathes, heaving as he tries to regain his wits.

“Sorry,” Steve replies, rubbing his neck sorely. “Didn’t mean to scare you.”

“Yeah, you’ve said.”

“Sorry.”

“Stop apologising! It’s fine. Just…let me catch my breath. Think we’ve solved the mystery of how you get here.”

“We have?”

“Well, I had to ask for you to come again which is a pain but I think it’s how this is gonna work.”

“Well, if that’s the case, ask for me whenever you want.”

“I don’t want to interrupt-“

“Buck,” Steve cuts off. “I’m _dead_ , if you don’t remember. When I’m not with you, I’m not doing anything else. Well, not as much as you’d think.”

“Oh…yeah.”

“Don’t look so glum. There’s nothing to be sad about. I like spending time with you anyway.”

“Oh. Thanks?”

“Don’t sound so confused,” Steve laughs. “I really do.”

“Well, thanks,” Bucky tries, this time with a little more conviction.

“So, how long have I been gone for this time? You seem less annoyed so I’m hoping not as long.”

“Two weeks, just about. And, going back a bit, what do you mean as much as you’d think? What _do_ you do.”

“Well,” Steve pauses for a moment, mulling over his words, “there’s other people up there. I can talk to them. They seem very interested in talking to me,” he mutters bitterly.

“How come?”

“Some people don’t like that I’m coming back to Earth.”

“Shit, Steve. Am I causing you problems? You shouldn’t be doing this if it’s-“

“Stop,” Steve interrupts, “don’t say that. I hardly know these people, they’re just…jealous. Probably. I’ll be fine.”

“But Steve-“

“No. Let’s leave it. I’ll sort things out with her soon enough.”

“Her?”

“Yes, there’s someone up there who I think is speaking on behalf of the rest.”

“Oh…”

Steve chuckles a humourless laugh. “I know this is confusing so how about we leave it. I feel you have enough problems already, you don’t need mine.”

“No, it’s my turn to stop you. If I get to burden you with my problems, you get to burden me with yours. Don’t go all 1940s stoic man on me, Rogers.”

“I’m not sure…I don’t know if I can.”

Bucky sighs, leaning further into the wall and focusing on the calming lull of the music. “Just try. For me?” Steve looks at him purposefully, eyebrows drawn, before he nods. “I’ll try.”

“Good.” Bucky smiles impishly, motioning for Steve to come sit with him, burying his feet further into the carpet. Steve settles beside him with much more grace than you would expect from a man of his size but it doesn’t surprise Bucky, especially if he used to be smaller, although he has an almost impossible time imagining it.

As both of them lie quietly on the carpet, the gentle hum of the music reverberating around the thin walls, Bucky turns and asks “how long were you away for? In your terms, I mean.”

Steve shrugs, looking contemplatively at the ceiling. “I don’t know. Not exactly. It’s easier now that I can compare it to real time but up there it’s like, like, time is timeless. It exists, you know it’s occurring but you don’t understand it. There’s a lot of things that feel different up there.” Bucky can’t deny his inexplicable interest, can’t deny the tug of curiosity that pulls to know what death’s like. He isn’t afraid to ask, either, until the words spill from his mouth.

“What’s it like. Up there?”

Steve turns calmly, frown evident, expression muddled. “I feel like that’s something I’m not supposed to reveal, is it? Knowing that life doesn’t just…end after death is a revelation, is it not?” Bucky shrugs, trying to hide his disappointment but Steve is quick to interject. “I’ll tell you one day, maybe when you’re older. Much older. That fair?”

“Do you think you’ll still be here when I’m older?” Bucky asks doubtfully.

Steve doesn’t answer immediately, mulling over his words. “I hope so.” His lips crook up into a dangerous smile. “I mean, what else is a _guardian angel_ for,” he mocks, chuckling deep in chest. Despite the calmness of the room, Bucky begins to chuckle too, tilting his head so it is gently pressed against Steve’s shoulder, a gentle comfort.

In the dull roar of silence, Bucky tries to relax. He buries further into Steve’s shoulder, barely clinging on the realms of ‘not being a hug’. He feels himself desperately clinging for the comfort, vying for the Eden comfort of another person: something he has been lacking for far too long. He prowls closer, rolling onto Steve’s chest, relishing in the arm that wraps around his shoulder. “Are you okay?” He asks gently as Bucky cautiously digs into his chest. Bucky nods, murmuring a quiet “just in an odd mood, that’s all.” Steve takes the explanation graciously and wraps his arm tighter around Bucky’s shoulder, soothingly rubbing his back as the track changes from one to the next. Bucky feels the pumping of anxiety as he tries to relax, knows he’s throwing himself in a dark area here, one that he doesn’t think he’s yet willing to fumble around in. He’s already treading a thin line with Steve: half way to falling, straight into Steve’s arms.

“Is this because I was gone for a while again?” Bucky shrugs noncommittally. “Come on, Buck, talk to me. I just want to help,” Steve deplores, tugging him in closer.

“I guess…” Bucky trails off, scrounging for words. “I think…I missed you?” The last half is almost unintelligible, and mumbled at best but Steve hears it nonetheless. He doesn’t bring it up, only gives Bucky a squeeze and tries not to think too hard about the implications, he’s here to help after all.

“I’m sorry, Buck. Call for me more often, won’t you? I worry about you and I have a lot of free time on my hands. Call me whenever you’re feeling down.”

“That’s a lot…” Bucky tries but can’t hide the brimming glee that someone, _someone_ , is worried about him.

“So I’ll be here a lot,” Steve promises, smiling gently into Bucky’s hair, ignoring the pressing urge to press a kiss to his head, ignoring the churning guilt in his stomach at the thought. “Anyway, what’s that you were doing?” Bucky looks up, seeing the splayed pages of paper that Steve’s motioning to. “Oh, just homework.”

“ _Just_ homework,” Steve mocks. “This is important stuff, Buck. Don’t let me get in the way of that. I’m happy to sit here while you get things done.” Bucky looks at Steve carefully, assessing his face before deeming him to be telling the truth and grabbing up the book and a pencil before trying to focus on jotting notes. Steve sits up beside him, turned so he can read the small pencilled in markings down the margins.

It’s not long, really, before Steve begins to give pointers. He may not be ‘academic’ in any way but Steve has good general knowledge and an eye for patterns, easily linking bits of the text that he didn’t think even needed to be linked. He’s also, less surprisingly, very good at the _application_ of the topic, which is almost more important. He makes anecdotes about baseball players he used to love and helps Bucky to understand the theory by simply motioning with his hands, every now and then joyously drawing with his thin tendrils of light to make one of the most vivid drawings Bucky’s ever seen - not only is it beautiful but accurate too. Then again, they are conjurings of his imagination so maybe it can not all be up to Steve’s artistic abilities. Steve learns along the way, not noticing when the small pin reaches the middle of the vinyl and the music comes to a sudden hissing halt.

Bucky has detailed notes on almost six pages of the textbook when Steve stretches upwards, clicking his back as he clambers to his feet. “What time is it?” He asks as Bucky yawns, covering his hand with his mouth. Behind bleary eyes, Bucky scans for the clock and sees the flickering red lights on his bedside table. “2 in the morning,” he groans, letting his head fall back against the wall. “Ugh, I have lectures in the morning. God, I hate Mondays.” Steve chuckles as he helps Bucky to his feet, gently pushing him towards the bed. “Then sleep, Buck.”

“But I don’t wanna!” He complains childishly, pouting.

“It’ll make you feel better in the morning. No wonder you feel bad a lotta of the time, you need to sleep more.”

“Yes, _mom_.”

“Jerk.”

“Punk.” Steve smiles at him as Bucky clambers under the sheets, shaking his head exasperatedly. “I’ll see you soon,” he whispers, not mentioning that Bucky hasn’t brushed his teeth yet, sure that one night won’t hurt.

“No!” Bucky says suddenly, eyes opening frantically, head still popping out from under the covers. “Don’t go. You only just got here.”

“I’ve been here for hours, Buck.”

“But you haven’t been here in two weeks. Stay? Please,” Bucky pleads quietly, trying his best to smile despite the tug of sleep. Steve sighs, ignoring the warm feeling in his chest. “Fine. But I don’t sleep anymore so I’m just gonna have to sit here whilst you sleep.”

Bucky shrugs, too tired to think too hard about the whole thing. “That’s fine. Also, add that to the list.”

“Will do,” Steve notes, returning to his previous spot against the wall, facing the bed. Bucky’s quick to fall quiet and, in the dark silence of the room, Steve finds himself examining the man (in the least creepy way he possibly can), from the top of his head to his chin, examining his features despite the dark shadows encasing the room. Moonlight flitters through the thin curtains but barely mangles the careful darkness of the room.

Brown hair, long and tangled. Blue eyes, hidden behind peacefully shut eyes. Cleft chin, cute, Steve thinks (forgetting to even shake himself out of it this time. He doesn’t dwell on it). The soft fall and rise of each breath. The gentle snuff of a man that might begin to snore. And-

“I’m not gonna be able to sleep if you keep staring, ya know.” Steve can’t contain the furious blush riding up his cheeks, thankful for the cover of darkness as he curls into himself. Bucky just chuckles under his breath, burying further into the covers as Steve averts his eyes, focusing on the wall.

As the passage time churns onwards, Steve closes his eyes and although he can’t sleep, he finds himself not far from that state. Almost meditative. Thoughts tumble and turn, appearing and leaving; ideas float to and fro, bringing great plans and bad, allowing himself to simply sift through his thoughts until he can clear the stupid from the good.

Steve’s always been a rather _rash_ guy (that much has been clear so far) but he relishes in the way he can just be left to think without the brewing anger that plagued his smaller form.

Soon enough, the thoughts turn to silence and he’s left in a conscious sleep, drifting between everything and nothing. Peace, he thinks, is an amenity he’d never had time before. And, for the first time yet, he’s finally truly _glad_ to be back.

 

 

The alarm wakes Bucky from sleep and Steve from his quiet brooding, who’d woken when the sunlight hit his eyelids. Bucky groans and whines the entire morning, letting Steve follow him for almost his entire morning routine, except for when he’s in the shower or running to the kitchen to bring breakfast back to his room. Steve, although he has no need for food, relishes in the it anyway. Bucky says it’s not anything complex, nor good, but Steve can’t remember having anything better. Ever. Probably says a lot more about the forties than it does Bucky’s (or one of his friends’) cooking skills. They eat in quiet comfort, Bucky scarfing down his food as the clock ticks closer and closer. By the time he’s done, he’s already half-put his jacket on and is slipping his feet into his shoes, fumbling around for his phone. “I’ve gotta go, got a bus to catch,” he rushes, chewing down the last of his toast by throwing his head back and letting it fall into his mouth.

“Have fun,” Steve smiles, watching Bucky intently. “What time you back?”

“Oh,” Bucky looks at the clock, entirely unnecessarily, “about five. Oh shit! You’re gonna be waiting for ages.” Suddenly, Bucky changes direction, falling to his knees and digging through one of his drawers. “It’s really old but you’ll still love it, Mr Forties,” Bucky says, handing Steve a large plate, not dissimilar to a phone, just much larger. “It’s a tablet. You turn it on here,” Bucky says, motioning to a small button on the side, “I’ll let you explore it from there. You have fun too!” Bucky shouts, already out the door, slinging his backpack over his shoulder, leaving Steve looking down at this ‘tablet’, confused.

Although, he can’t deny the trembling excitement raging through him.

 _Modern_ technology, things he could have only dreamed of as a kid, maybe even not. Back in the day, comics and pulp novels described clunky, metal monsters and large, steam-punk contraptions. Not this. Not this…sleekness. This is truly modern. This is advancement that no one could have thought of until it came.

Slowly, cautiously, Steve begins to look for other buttons, something that control this device when he sees he can control it by just _touching it_. Enraptured in the mechanics of it, he wildly starts tapping everything, the screen changing so often he can’t even see what’s going on until it’s still. He’s found something he can’t press. He’s on a menu of sorts. Across the top of the screen it says ‘settings’ and below it, it has a list of options but it appears the one he’s chosen (as it is highlighted in blue) is sound. He touches the small circle on the blue line but nothing changes. So, in a fit of mad curiosity, he begins to tap in different places until he taps on a different part of the blue line and the circle moves! And, just at the same time, a little square appears in the middle of the screen saying ‘sound’ with little squares underneath that shifts, presumably, due to how loud the tablets sounds will be.

Steve is in _awe_.

After a while, he begins to learns the mechanics a bit better. You don’t just tap, you _swipe_ and _scroll_ and _double tap_. It’s all so intricate that Steve knows that he’s doing it wrong but he can generally control the device nonetheless.

He scrolls through the little squares which he thinks is on the ‘main page’ of the device and taps on each one, exploring what each one does. One is a silly little game which involves swiping a lot as a running man moves, running away from a scary gorilla man that has Steve jumping out of his skin. The next one has a small little notepad replica on the screen which Steve finds not only can he write on (when he clicks on it, letters appear which he can type with! Like a dispensable typewriter!) but draw on too! He clicks on the little pen on the bottom row of little icons and begins to scribble doodles onto the page.

To say they are awful is an understatement but Steve loves the sentiment nonetheless. He doesn’t doubt that drawing on something like this takes practice and skill, just as much as it takes to move from any other form of art to another.

He continues to pass through the apps, passing another few games and an app called ‘Safari’ which he finds, after a _lot_ of effort, will tell him anything. Anything! He even searches the app he’s on but the words they use don’t help him all that much. For now, he is okay to not understand. Bucky will tell him.

Then, he clicks on the button that has a colourful music note on it and, after a little more fiddling, finds that it plays _music_. (That’s what the volume button is for!)

The music is jarring, a little out of his comfort zone, but far different to what he’d heard at the 80s themed party. Instead, it’s slow, mellow - far more mellow than anything he’s heard before. The voice is the closest he’s ever to heard to an artist crying in a song but it is, beyond that, the most beautiful thing he’s ever heard. He fiddles around for longer, pressing on random buttons until the song changes: changing the atmosphere along with it. This song it upbeat, poppy, but not in the way the ’80’s’ music was. No, it’s clearer, like the sound is real and not recorded like it is over a radio (or at least one from his time) but it’s also different in an entirely inexplicable way that can only come from music that has changed over decades. Different instruments he notes, different voices. New people.

He loves it anyway.

He won’t deny the classics, thinks he still prefers them but he won’t pretend he doesn’t have the enjoyment of modern music either. It sounds like a live band in a dance club (one that he’d never got to do anything but sit and nurse a drink as the girls flittered around with more handsome boys).

He misses those days. (He can’t help but add in his mind that he misses the simplicity of boy meets girl; not because it is what is ‘right’ but simply because the mechanism seemed to flow so much better. No confusion. No questioning. Just ease).

He misses being in the forties.

He looks down at the tablet.

But he could get used to this.

 

 

Bucky rushes out of class like a bull is tailing him, ignoring the cold whip of the spring air. May is in full force and whilst the flowers bloom, the English weather tears itself apart as it fights between Winter and Summer in a dire mix of cold and rain with sporadic bursts of unexpected sunshine. Today, despite the cold rushes of wind, the sun shines brightly in the sky, obscured by a thin layer of cloud that still seems rather good for an English day.

He walks briskly back, turning down street after street with precise memory, barely stopping to think where he’s going, letting his body tug him in the right direction. With the autonomy that comes with walking home, his mind drifts. He checks off what he needs to do, needlessly plugs his headphones in despite his current disinterest in his music (just so he doesn’t have to hear the useless garble of the streets) but with nothing left of importance, his mind wanders into dangerous territory, like a man walking into a dark woods with a knife in his pocket - knowing he can protect himself but unable to stop the fast palpitations of his anxious heart.

He thinks of Steve.

How wonderful Steve is. How nice Steve is. How cute Steve is. How powerful Steve is. How handsome Steve is. How clever Steve is. How pretty Steve is and-

Shit.

Despite this, though, in the safe haven of his own thoughts, he lets the trail of thought go on. He lets himself vision what it would be like if he and Steve were a couple. Then, after that, imagines what it would be like it they were a normal couple. He ignores the pang in his stomach when his body just wants Steve to be ‘his’.

Shit.

He knows once he’s on this trail of thought, it’s not going to end well. He’s unbuttoned the pouch that he hid these thoughts out and slowly they spill out, little by little. He imagines everything from the sweet to the graphic, shuddering with distaste as his mind travels to far off scenarios that Bucky doesn’t even think he wants.

(Yes, you don’t want that, he reminds himself. Why would Steve wear a dress at their wedding?)

Suddenly fearing his own desires, he shakes off the whole chain of thought, prowling home as quickly as possible as he focuses on getting back to Steve and distracting himself from his ‘Steve thoughts’ with Steve himself.

By the time Bucky is home, Steve is still on the tablet, his eyes wide in awe as his mindlessly taps at the screen, bringing up all sorts of nonsense that Bucky doesn’t understand why he wants to see.

“Whatcha up to?” Bucky asks as he comes closer, seeing Steve switch back to a previous article and skim over the first paragraph. Steve tries to hide the fact that he jumps but he’s evidently surprised nonetheless.

“Nothing much,” Steve shrugs, scrolling down further.

“You seem pretty handy with that thing,” Bucky teases. “Sorry for not showing you the ropes, I was in a hurry.”

“It’s no problem, it was really interesting to figure out,” Steve beams. “When I was younger, I couldn’t even imagine having something like this. No, I couldn’t even imagine something like this would _exist_.” Bucky smiles and goes to sit down next to Steve. “You can find _everything_ , Buck. Everything! Look.” Steve motions for Bucky to look down at the tablet and reads the headline:

**GUARDIAN ANGELS? ARE THESE STORIES PROOF THAT THEY EXIST?**

Bucky thinks it’s a little clickbait-y but with his current situation, he’s not hesitant to begin reading. He’s not surprised when it tends to bring up a lot of Christians but he’s also truly interested in the few that don’t think it’s part of God’s work (or any other religion, for that matter). A few say they have sighings of angels. Others have experiences. Some tend to refer to real people, some seem to refer to phantom beings.

Bucky is intrigued by the human aspect.

A lot of people say that it’s husbands or wives or children that become their ‘guardian angels’ but there’s one account, one that Bucky is incredibly drawn to, written by a man called Tod Beckington about a man that came and go as he pleased, helping him through hard times when he was diagnosed with cancer.

Although the story differs at points from Bucky’s, he thinks he may have found someone with a similar predicament.

“Do you think this is true?” Bucky gasps but Steve is quick to shake his head. “No. Meloda, someone I know up there, said I was the first down since…well, Zeus. These people must be in a very bad place to imagine these things.”

“You don’t think someone could have snuck out?”

“Unless there’s something large I’m missing about up there, I can’t imagine so, no.” Bucky’s a little disappointed but covers it with a poor attempt at humour. “So, as the only one down here, you think you’re willing to be a true guardian angel? You have a lot to live up to if Zeus was the last visitor.”

“I think I am,” Steve says a little too seriously, once again, not quite grasping the nuances of modern humour (or maybe just humour at all, he didn’t really have much practice at socialising when he grew up). “You need someone to help you properly and that’s my job. I’m not going to be lax on it anymore. It’s my duty.” Bucky doesn’t think he’s ever heard someone be more righteous in their life. Then again, it’s no surprise that Steve Rogers is going to be more righteous than any other man he’s met.

“Oh…wow. Okay,” Bucky breathes, unable to find words.

“So, you alright with me sticking around for a bit? I can leave during the night if that makes you more comfortable, you just have to call for me in the morning.” Bucky nods agreeably and adds, “possibly best if you don’t stay here all night, yeah. Especially if time up there goes quicker. Don’t want you to be bored.”

“Never would be.”

“Yeah, yeah, you can say that but say that after a few nights. You’ll be lying.”

Steve thinks about it and deflates with “okay, maybe, but remember to call for me in the mornings.”

“Of course, stop worrying, punk.”

“I will when you call for me more often than once a fortnight, jerk.”

“Hey!” They both dissolve into giggles, rolling backwards onto the bed, staring up at the ceiling.

“If we’re going to do this, I probably have to go outside with you,” Steve adds, sounding a little timid.

“Yeah, makes sense.” Bucky pauses. “I have an idea,” he says abruptly, sitting up again, Steve following. “I’m going to make you a persona. A modern one. One that you can roll with when people ask you questions. Like an undercover cop.”

“Are you trying to make me the protagonist of a pulp?”

“Maybe! But that’s the fun of it! Come on, Steve Rogers, I’m gonna need a little information about you if I’m going to make this easy for you to remember.”

“I don’t know where to start…”

“Look. We need a few things. How you know me. Where me met. Age. Work. Hobbies, etc.”

“What do you want our relationship to be?”

The question sucks the life outta Bucky but he tries to cover it with a nervous-sounding laugh. “How ‘bout best friend. We say you moved from Brooklyn so I met you back in middle school. Best friends ever since.”

“Sounds good, Buck.”

“Awesome,” Bucky grins. “Now, we need more. What did you like to do back in the good old days.”

Steve ponders for a moment and comes to a conclusion. “Art. I used to draw a lot. Mostly charcoal but we couldn’t afford much. I just got by with what I had.”

“Perfect! We say you’re my artsy friend. You’re a freelance artist for whatever you want. You don’t go to Uni because you already have a job. Now, final key bit of information (if anything else is asked, make it up and you can memorise it later): age.”

“Go back a bit. Artist friend? You say that like it’s a type of friend.”

“Well of course it is! Everyone has an artsy friend that they complain to about how awful they are at art. And they’re always the cool one that has better dress sense. Just…look, ignore that, it’s a thing. Now, age.”

Steve chooses 22.

Bucky smiles and begins to twist even more of a story out of it.

 

 

The first challenge comes four days later, on Friday evening, when Bucky gets invited to go the bar with the usual group and a few outliers that decide to tag along, mostly in their own groups, and Bucky decides that its time for Steve’s first real test in the real world (though, if he’s honest, Bucky’s only going out because his friends are beginning to fall on the desperate side). This time, he can’t hide behind music and drinks in a dimly lit house. This time, he’ll be in a bar, socialising, with friends of Bucky who are clearly invested in learning where this man came from and they’ve only heard about him now.

Steve, as becomes evident quickly enough, is less that adept to modern life - severely. Bucky, hoping to some extent that Steve is a good actor, is quickly proved wrong. He stumbles through social interaction, fumbling with modern culture and attempts, badly, to lie his way through his past. “Definitely grew up in a religious cult,” his friends agree, quickly followed by “or was kidnapped and only just got out. Though, I think he’d be a bit more fucked up if he was.” Bucky, shamefully, found most of these theories hard to dispel, especially when they touched, to some extent, the true situation. It starts from the first “hey, fellas” in a way that inches towards kindly grandfather and very much not ‘art student’ and most definitely not the hipster Bucky was aiming at.

It is all of an hour later (after a litany of embarrassments which will be listed below) that Bucky drags Steve home in the most gentle manner possible, trying to reassure Steve that “no, no! You did fine! Just a little more practice needed. Come on.”

  1. “What is ‘lol’?”
  2. “Um, should I yeet the bartender?” (If only said because Dugan made a bad reference that Steve, inevitably, didn’t know was all that bad).
  3. “Well you’re cooking with gas.” (Translation: you’re doing something right. But, now that gas cooking is not only usual but even slightly outdated, means nothing even close to its original meaning).
  4. “When’s the dancing start?”
  5. “Language!” (It just slips out).
  6. “If you fellas don’t go to church more, something bad’s gonna happen.” (The list goes on but I’m too embarrassed to put in any additions). 



When they arrive home, Steve looks downtrodden and embarrassed and as soon as Bucky shuts the door Steve admits “that was awful, wasn’t it?”

Bucky sighs, falling into honesty like a second skin. “Yeah, sorry pal. It was pretty atrocious. But, it’s given me an idea.”

“What is it?”

“The first lesson in your major: Modern Life. Artfully named, Lesson One: The Art of Modern Living.”

“I thought I was supposed to be helping you?”

“Eh, that doesn’t matter. Helping you is helping me feel useful so that’s what we’re gonna do. Let’s say I have a bit of a saviour complex. I like sticking up for the little guys who can’t do it themselves,” he pauses, watching Steve try and defend himself, “ _even if_ they think they can.”

Steve sighs. “Fine, maybe I do need some help. But only if it’s helping you.”

Somehow, this turns into an evening of learning about ‘modern life’, beginning on technology. They go through the tablet again, then phones, then laptops and then some general other items like kitchen appliances and calculators, Bucky explaining each one in meticulous detail for Steve’s, frankly, ridiculous memory (another thing to add to the list).

“So!” Bucky announces at the end, “test on Sunday. Gives you something to do when I’m out.”

“But I remember everything you said.”

“Exactly, so I’ve given you the basics and the tools to find more. When I’m at lectures, do your own research.”

“Fine.” Steve pauses. “On one condition.”

“What is it?”

“Well, I know you say this is helping but I still want to do something in return. If I do this test for you, I want you to confide in me more. Tell me what you’re struggling with. If it’s just that day or something that’s been bugging you for years, I don’t mind, I just want you to tell me. And then we can both be helped.”

Bucky ponders for a moment, reluctant but understanding the necessity and agrees with a reluctant “fine. But if I do this, I’m making the test _really_ hard.”

It seems not hard enough because when Sunday roles around, Steve gets only one (of forty, Bucky was determined to make it extra difficult) wrong, and it’s a question more based on physics than practical skill where Steve got mixed up between conduction and convection and only because he doesn’t actually know what the second one is. And, not only does he ace the test, he also adds some things that weren’t in the test that even _Bucky_ doesn’t know. Funny facts. Inventors. Other things they made. Bad alterations made in history. Everything. Bucky is amazed: not only by the facts but the fact that Steve remembers all of them too.

But, with Steve’s amazing memory, and the introduction of lesson 2 (of which another test will happen next Sunday) of ‘Lesson One: The Art of Modern Living’, modern vernacular, Bucky has to begin his side of the bargain, something he still feels a little uncomfortable doing.

He and Steve sit side by side on his bed, feet lain out in the front of them, backs against the headboard, Bucky’s head securely facing the far wall, not daring to look at Steve. “Any problem?” He asks.

“Any.”

“I don’t know what to say,” Bucky admits.

“If I ask you what’s wrong, right now, right here, what’s your answer? What, apart from this, evidently, is making you feel uncomfortable or sad or even…”

“Suicidal?”

“Yeah,” Steve breathes reluctantly.

“Okay. I can tell you anything? You won’t tell anyone?”

“Yeah. And got no one to tell.”

“Okay then…lets start on my friends.” He chooses it because they’re out, he knows they won’t overhear.

“Okay then.”

Bucky breathes, begins on a shaky introduction, trying to find a way into what he really wants to say. He’s scrambled through a few muddy sentences when he finally reaches “I just don’t want to be friends with them.” He sighs. “It’s that simple. But I can’t leave, I _live_ with them. It’s not even that I don’t like them! I’m just not apart of them. I feel like an outlier and I shouldn’t have to. But I am, partly because I don’t want the hassle of changing the current situation but maybe also because I’m scared of leaving them. I’ve known them all for a year now but I’ve talked to them more than I’ve talked to anyone else, even my family. What am I supposed to do without them? You don’t mind that I’m saying this, right? I’m allowed to dislike people, right? It’s not like…immoral or anything. Because you know about all that stuff, don’t you. I dunno, guess if it is I’ll just take it up with the big man himself. I feel fucking trapped enough in this bloody concrete jungle, I don’t think hell’s gonna do much harm to me.”

Bucky pauses for a moment, just a moment, staring blankly at the wall and adds: “I just don’t want to be alone.”


	6. Not About Angels

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Happy Holidays everyone! I'm sorry this update took two weeks but I'm looking for that to be a maximum limit. This chapter is almost double the length of the first so I'm hoping that makes up for it. Not sure if I'm happy with this chapter yet, it changes scene quite a lot but I hope that you enjoy nonetheless :)
> 
> [warning, not all of this is proof-read or edited, simply because I wasn't very happy with it so please excuse any small mistakes]

****_**BUCKY & STEVE - BUCKY’S BEDROOM** _

“[Okay](https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=vj_VidtyaOc), okay. It’s time for the next lesson. Lesson Five: Modern Culture!” Steve laughs at Bucky’s grandiose actions and leans back on the bed as Bucky prances around the room. It’s Monday and Bucky is already prepping Sunday’s test, filled with modern culture: from memes to politics, now all rolled into a 200 mark test (which Steve, with his memory, is certainly capable of). Term has ended, Bucky’s term having run over the usual March ending by a huge two months, in which he had decided to remain in Manchester and work on his coursework: checking in with a teacher, and private tutor (who has been in charge of his ‘lectures’, a kind soul who took pity on his situation, being so behind his classmates), who would be around until July for their own personal reasons.

It has to be said now that Bucky does not want to go see his family. His three sisters are with their mum, freshly divorced from their father, who has run back to New York with what Bucky thinks may be a new girlfriend and a new job. Unwilling to put up with three girls and a volatile mother, he’s voting to stay until it’s time to go see his father back in New York, hopefully giving him a chance to look around Brooklyn and maybe even reunite with a few old friends.

“Culture? Didn’t we cover that in Modern Life?”

“To some extent,” Bucky argues “but this will be more focused. And if that test helps then so be it.”

“How teacher-like of you.”

“Why thank you,” Bucky teases with a dramatic bow, holding one on of his arms pretentiously in the air whilst his other remains tightly around his waist. “Now that my lectures are over,” (Bucky has still not admitted to Steve that he’s not really going to lectures but private tutoring. The whole reason behind it is too embarrassing. Either way, Bucky’s just glad his friends have stuck around until now, with only Morita going off to visit family so far, meaning Steve is none the wiser) “I have the freedom to become _your_ teacher and I take the job very seriously! It is very important to me that you know everything about modern life.”

Steve laughs gently. “Do you think you can really teach me _everything_?”

“But of course!” Bucky replies sarcastically, “it is a very plausible aim.”

Steve laughs a little louder. “I’m sure it is. So, where do we start?”

They talk about modern culture until around noon, when Bucky’s stomach growls and Steve can’t help but burst out into childish giggles. “Okay, okay,” Bucky relents “it’s food time.” Steve follows Bucky down into the kitchen, watching as he skims through the fridge and misses when Gabe enters the room, as calmly reserved as always. “Oh hi, Steve,” he smiles, ignoring the way Bucky jumps and drops a yoghurt onto the floor, especially ignoring the large splat it makes on the tiles (Bucky tries to clean it up as surreptitiously as he can). “Hi Gabe,” Steve replies cordially, leaning against the countertop, hands resting on either side of him on the counter. “Anything good in there, Buck?” Gabe asks, motioning to the fridge as he grabs a glass from the cabinet and pours himself a glass of water. Bucky shrugs, skimming the fridge once again for something that’s not the half exploded yoghurt he threw in the bin. “Not much. Might be better off getting takeaway.”

“Or going grocery shopping,” Gabe interjects like its plainly obvious.

“Oh fuck off,” Bucky laughs with only a minor undercurrent of plain annoyance. “I’m getting takeaway anyway. You want anything specific Steve?” Since finding out about the mass of options for food nowadays, Steve usually lets Bucky take the lead but since his first experience with Chinese a few days ago, he happily asks for it again. “Perfect choice,” Bucky commends, calling up the local Chinese to place down an order, inputting his usual, choosing as good as he can for Steve and ordering a chow mein for Gabe when he asks. “You’re paying though,” he adds and Gabe shrugs dismissively in a half-yes. They sit in a barely comfortable silence for all of five minutes before Gabe tries to spark up conversation shyly. “So, what are you guys doing for the holidays? Not long before all of us head off. Bit crap that we still have to pay the rent whilst we’re gone though.”

“Yeah, don’t think I’m gonna be gone for long, though,” Bucky responds.

“Where are you planning to go?” Gabe asks.

“New York. See my dad. See some old friends. Get a taste of home.”

“Sounds good. I’m staying with my family for the next couple months. Can’t decide whether it will be heaven or hell,” Gabe chuckles, trying to offset the uncomfortable mist settling over the conversation. Steve, in all this time, has not said a word. The doorbell rings and saves Bucky from the conversation: never has he been so glad that the Chinese is so close. Steve sets to follow him too, leaving Gabe to mill around uncomfortably in the kitchen. Bucky takes as long as he possibly can to return to the kitchen, Steve tailing him silently when Gabe saves him from any further encounters by taking his mein and whispering in Bucky’s ear (“sorry”) and fleeing. Bucky gapes after him, bag held numbly in his hand. ‘What?’ He mouths into the distance, brows furrowed deeply.

Steve remains silent.

Bucky sits down opposite Steve and unpacks his pork, delving in as Steve whispers “you didn’t tell me you were going to New York.”

Bucky’s eyes dart upwards. “Didn’t think it was important. You’ll be coming with either way, right?” Bucky shrugs, taking another scoop of food into his mouth.

“Yeah but…Buck,” Steve sighs, “did you not think telling me would have been…nice?” Bucky drops his food, eyes now alert as he looks up at Steve. “You’re really annoyed at me, aren’t you,” Bucky starts, voice suddenly trembling. He stares down into his meal, stomach suddenly full, appetite lost, whilst Steve looks forlornly out the window, sighing. “Look, Buck, I just wished you told me. New York is...important to me. You know I’ll just follow you; wherever you go, I go. But, this is Brooklyn, where I grew up and from seeing this city alone, I can only imagine how much it’s changed. This is a big step for me.” Bucky wallows in guilt as he picks out bits of chicken from his noodles, and takes a moment before speaking. “Sorry. I just…I didn’t think. That’s on me.”

“Yeah, it is, Buck. But, don’t start pitying yourself for it. Take responsibility for your actions and sort them.”

“Are you really giving me a moral lesson _now_ ,” Bucky whines.

“Yes,” Steve replies easily, his tone still serious. “Because now is a good time to do so. If you wallow in your guilt and let it fester, you’re never going to resolve the problem. I think you should have told me, now you have, and you’ve apologised. So now, make sure you tell me other things when I’m involved. Learn from your mistakes.”

Bucky groans. “God, you sound like one of my old teachers.”

“Buck, I’m serious.”

He sobers. “I know. I will.”

“Good.”

“Forgiven?”

“Forgiven.”

“Okay then,” Bucky smiles weakly, “so, now that you know, how about we make a few plans.”

“I thought you were just going to see your dad?” He pauses. “And a few friends,” he amends.

“Yeah but that’s only going to fill so much time. You’ve already said Brooklyn is important to you so we can bring you around. Maybe look into your past because if I’m honest, I’m still not entirely convinced about this whole thing.”

Steve laughs. “I’ve given you plenty of proof.”

“And it’s still an entirely unreal situation. I’m 90% sure I’m dreaming but come on, what do you want to do in Brooklyn. You were ill a lot as a kid, weren’t you, what did you miss out on doing? Where didn’t you go? Where _did_ you go, that’s probably the most important step in figuring out your past. How much do you think you remember?”

“It’s still patchy. It’s like I can see flashes or…photographs. But I can’t piece together the story behind them. Names are still beyond me. Faces are blurry. If I focus on myself, it’s a lot clearer, stories start to emerge, but if I think about anyone else, it just all drifts away. Even my own family,” Steve sighs.

“So basically, not much?”

A smile twitches on Steve’s lips. “Yeah, not much.”

“Well then, we’ve got a whole trip to figure it out.”

 

 

“Buck? Buck, wake up,” Steve whispers gently as the alarm blares in the background; Bucky still isn’t waking up. Or, well, maybe he is if the groaning is anything to account for but he’s not _getting_ up. “Buck, come on, get up, it’s late.”

“No,” Bucky whispers, his voice hoarse.

“Come on, you wanted to go out today, right? Needed to get food that wasn’t ‘shitty takeaway’ as you like to put it.”

Bucky huffs a laugh. “Don’t swear, Steve, it doesn’t suit you.” He speaks so quietly that Steve can hardly hear him, the whispers lost behind the loud wail of the alarm clock. Huffing, Steve turns the alarm off, knowing that at least Bucky’s awake now, if not moving. “I know, Buck. Come on, why aren’t you getting up?”

“Don’t wanna,” he whispers petulantly, staring blankly at the wall as he buries himself deeper into the pillow, pulling the duvet that Steve’s sitting on over his shoulder with unprecedented strength.

“Come on.” Steve tries to pull back the duvet but Bucky grips onto it like a lifeline. “What’s up?” Steve asks softly as he lets go of the duvet. “Are you ill?” Steve presses the back of his hand to Bucky’s forehead, feeling nothing.

“Leave it, Steve,” Bucky sighs like all the energy’s been sapped out of him. Steve stares down at him, panic flooding over him like a gentle wave, too sudden yet ever-caressing. Bucky buries himself even further into his cocoon as Steve removes himself from the bed and picks up the tablet, skimming through websites on modern history: World War II (which he rages over when he finds out about Pearl Harbour), Vietnam, JFK and so on. Bucky - even once Steve gets to very recent history, Ellis’ presidency and his current running against a woman candidate in the elections - has yet to move. Every now and then, he’ll huff a sigh and shuffle a little but Steve watches him from the corner of his eye as he stares blankly at the white wall.

Time ticks on seamlessly, the empty vacantness of the room looming gravely over the two men. Steve breathes steadily, trying to calm the overwhelming inability he’s perpetuating in his mind. Meanwhile, Bucky examines the cracks and seams of the walls, wondering how the hell it came back to this. Everything had been going _fine_. Just fine. Steve had overcome his anger. New York plans were made; they’d leave in less than a week. He was prepared, he was ordered, everything was _fine_. Yet, his mind tells him it’s not. Everything’s wrong, ‘it’s wrong!’ it screams and so he’s stuck in his own loop of helplessness as his limbs freeze and he’s stuck motionless in his bed wondering how the fuck it came to this.

“Steve,” he whispers hoarsely, pushing past the buzzing headache and the heavy feeling in his heart.

“Yeah?” Steve answers gently, cautiously turning onto his side and watching Bucky through pitiful eyes.

“I don’t feel so good.”

“I know, pal, you want to talk about it?” Bucky shrugged nonchalantly, trying to put off the inevitable conversation that wouldn’t help, or solve anything but maybe, just maybe, would push him out of the loop. And maybe that wasn’t always a good thing. Maybe it would throw him into limbo, pushed further into self-hatred by his own inability to talk and solve his problems. Maybe, just maybe, though, it would help him, maybe the weight would be off his chest, maybe he could let someone else hold the burden of his baggage and he could just _breathe_. “I don’t know.”

“That’s okay,” Steve coaxes, drawing closer to Bucky and shaking his shoulder gently. “Just sit up so we can talk, okay?” Bucky nods reluctantly and heaves himself into a sitting position, feeling useless as his limbs are magnetised to the bed. Helplessly, he looks at Steve, feeling the wallowing guilt at Steve’s own helpless eyes. “Now, you gonna tell me what’s going on?”

“Just a bad day,” Bucky admits.

“For any particular reason?”

Bucky sighs, shaking his head. “No. It’s just me.” He pauses. “I don’t know, sometimes- sometimes, it’s- it’s-“

“Shh,” Steve interrupts quietly, “don’t panic, breathe. It doesn’t have to all come out at once.”

“I just-“ Bucky sighs. “I don’t know. I really don’t. I thought everything was going fine but every now and then I just wake up and…I can’t.”

“Can’t what?”

“I don’t know. Anything?” Bucky says as he looks up at Steve with watery eyes, pushed forth by the frustration that the numbness brings, trying to push back the overwhelming urge to cry. “Everything just feels like it’s out of reach. I should just be glad term’s over. Those were the worst.”

Steve falls further into helplessness as he fumbles for explanations, or words, or suggestions. He’s blank. He never…he never suffered this. He’s never seen anyone suffer this. A modern condition, he thinks. He knows people who took their lives, happened too often back in the day, even with the Church’s rules: poverty struck everyone in different ways. But this, this is something else entirely. This…uselessness.

“What am I supposed to do?” Steve asks, curiosity overpowering his urge to empathise. And whoever said Steve didn’t face things head on? Steve may be desperately clawing to modern customs - openness, lack of stoicism, talking - but every now and then he falls into old ways. He may still be able to empathise but brutal bluntness takes over. Not that he’s really touched that at all yet. It just feels…Steve isn’t sure. Maybe it’s the look on Bucky’s face, or the helplessness in his own heart, but he can’t help but feel the words are the wrong things to say.

“I don’t know. Depression’s a bitch.”

“Depression?”

Bucky sighs, irritation bubbling at the surface. “Yeah, depression, you know what that is?”

“No?”

“You didn’t have that back in the forties?”

“Depends what it is,” Steve replies, treading lightly, seeing the major swing Bucky’s about to take with his mood - he can see it, uncontrollable, behind his eyes, like he’s been waiting far too long to explode and this is simply an excuse to let him let go.

“I don’t know. Sadness? No, not really. Numbness. People feeling sorry for themselves, throwing pity parties. I don’t know. Pretty sure, back in the day, they put people in mental hospitals for it.”

“So it’s a…mental disability?”

Bucky huffs a sarcastic laugh. “Yeah, I guess it is.”

“And you have it?”

“Undiagnosed. But probably.”

“So you might not?” Wrong words. Wrong words.

“Oh, maybe I fucking don’t and that’s why I’m stuck in bed all day feeling like shit! Maybe, huh?! You think I’d do this is a was normal?!” Bucky shouts, the covers falling from around him like a hell-circle. “You think I want this?” He chokes out.

“No. No!” Steve hurries to reply, guilt sinking through his skin like water into a sponge. “ I just…didn’t want to jump to conclusions.”

“Well fucking good for you. Now fuck off,” Bucky spits, burying himself back into the covers and putting his back to Steve, ignoring the flash of pain that ruptures through Steve’s body as he pulls himself away, stands and hovers his hand against the ever-present square in the corner of his vision. “I’m sorry, Buck,” he whispers and disappears.

His heart is heavy but at least time passes quickly here, he thinks. Maybe Bucky will forgive him by the time he can even remember to be sad. Of course, that’s not how it works, for he’s sad already.

 

 

Bucky remains in bed until the sun sets and the moonlight comes back to flood his room with ethereal, preternatural light. Bucky remains there until the moonlight is shrouded by clouds and he’s left in the true darkness of the night. He lies there, painfully aware of the time that’s ticking past, cursing himself for wasting his life while also finding no energy to do anything with it. By the time he’s mustered the energy to care about the passage of time, he’s already tossed away the thought of doing anything; he’s already given up his miserable existence for the warm, safe comfort of his bed. It’s safe here, his mind reminds him, stay here. It’s safe here. Safe from people, from friends. Safe from even the angels invading your room. Safe from the people that care. Safe from the people that don’t.

Safe from the people that don’t care, he reminds himself.

But safe from the people that do care, he argues.

The metal energy it takes to fight is enough for him to give up once again. With the entirety of his being sapped out of him, he lets his heart lead him to an untrodden territory of emotions that, with any sanity, he would not have dared crossed.

He thinks about Steve and…fuck. God, he thinks about Steve. His heart almost tears itself apart because it is _Steve_ : perfect, caring, lovely Steve. 40’s Steve, very straight Steve, very old-fashioned Steve. Bucky has to remind himself of that as he so often struggles to do and the inability almost pulls him further into his own trap of a mind. Steve is the light at the edge of his darkness but he can’t seem to grasp it without spreading the black out further. Bucky wishes he could just throw it away, screw it all to hell and continue life on his own. He could. If he has to call for Steve in order for him to come down then he could just never call for him again. Simple as that. But, he thinks (and there’s always a but) could he do that? Could he really give this all up? He won’t admit it, won’t say love aloud, but he ponders it in his head.

He might be in love (he can only base it on vague recollections of meaningless past relationships), he might not be. But if he _is_ , could he give it up? For a moment, Bucky thinks ‘yes, definitely’, like the answer is simple as that. It could be, he thinks, as the realisation dawns upon him. But it’s not, he knows. Steve’s a fucking angel, for lack of a better term that doesn’t seem outlandish or unattainable, and who is he to give that up? This is special; who in their right mind would send away an angel. Steve may come and go, may not stick around for long, or may stick around for as long as Bucky lives but he’ll always make Bucky special, just by his presence alone. So who is he to give that up. If anything it’s Steve who has the options here. He’s the one with nothing to gain. He could visit anyone on Earth to get here. Or just pop down to see Bucky and fuck right off. Bucky’s seen no sign that anything’s stopping Steve from doing that.

Fuck, he thinks. He’s this close, _this_ close, from losing Steve because they’re tied together by nothing but fragile sentiment and Steve’s abundant kindness. But Bucky hasn’t seen the limits of this kindness nor has he seen any proof that sentiment is anything but fragile.

‘I don’t want to be alone again’, he says silently to the ceiling, ‘please don’t leave me. I know I don’t deserve you and there’s nothing keeping you here but please don’t go’.

“Stop.” Bucky startles and flies from his spot on the bed to the furthest place from where a fuming Steve stands, eyes like knives, arms folded, expression deadly. “Don’t think like that.”

Bucky startles a laugh, his irritation flooding back to the surface like an old friend. “Oh, you’re the fucking thought police now, are you?”

Steve sighs, bullheadedly arguing, “no. You can think what you like. Except stuff like that because it’s not _true_. I’m not giving you up any time soon and although I can’t begin to fathom the reasons you think I’m going to, I’m assuring you here and now that I’m not.”

Bucky sighs, letting some of the irritation seep away, trying to ignore the utter shift in reality that comes with someone being able to just appear, without precedence or warning.

“You can’t promise that. Nothing’s holding you to me. What happens if we argue? Or disagree? What then. Are you going to promise to stay? Even after that?”

“We’re not always going to agree, Buck, that’s life but can’t you see, that’s not going to send me flying. Haven’t we already argued? New York, just now - if it’s the same day still - and I’m still here, aren’t I? We can move past it. We can resolve it. Sometimes we’ll need a break, that’s fine. That’ll work but I’ll never leave forever unless you ask that of me, Buck. I won’t.” The tirade of words almost break Bucky into pieces: the sentiment, the kindness and honesty behind them. It breaks his heart to realise that he still doesn’t believe Steve, that his fragile mental state is once again keeping him from enjoying the miracles that he’s being presented with. Once, he’d been told to list the things that he thinks are good in his life; he doesn’t remember what for, possibly a school lesson, though he can’t think what subject. And at the time, when he’d still lived in Brooklyn, the list had been nice to look at albeit short. There were things he was grateful for, things that he knew he would keep: his family, a home, the chance to go to school. They’d told them to write even the most basic of necessities so he’d added food, clean water, availability of showers and such.

He’d written another one a year into University as a therapy exercise, remembering the proud feeling he’d once had. The list was shorter. The list was less secure; the things he had could be gone at a moments notice. That might have been the first sign of his depression, how he focused so much on what he could lose that he never thought to enjoy the things he had now, especially whilst they were still here.

“You can’t promise, Steve.”

“But I am!”

“But that’s not enough, is it?!” Bucky shouts, standing as his whole body explodes. He’s sick of being calm, sick of doing as he’s told. He’s backed into a corner and he fixes it the only way he knows how: lashing out. “Because I’m fucked in the head and there’s nothing you can do about that! All I can think is about you leaving so what’s the point in you being here?! It’s fucking unfair to me. You being here makes me worry even fucking more yet you leaving is going to make me miserable. I don’t even know why I’m fucking surprised: shit’s unfair, I’ve got that by now. But maybe this hurts just a bit more because there’s a glimpse of hope when you’re around and all I can do is snuff it out like I do everything! I’ve finally found something but it’s out of touch. I could try and try, I could take you around the world and laugh and sing and have fun and do whatever shit they do in films but it wouldn’t be enough. So I’m letting go, I’m fucking daring to let it go. So fuck off, Steve, and don’t come back. At least then you don’t have to keep your promise.” He breaks, choking on his words, not even bothering to notice the tear stains on his cheek. “I don’t want to be made special because of you. My life is not about…fucking angels. This is my life and I’m going to live it by my fucking self.”

Steve’s staring, stock still, like he’s got a gun cocked at his head and he’s about to shoot. He looks…devastated. Broken. Oh fuck what has he done? “You don’t mean that,” Steve chokes out, refusing the tears that threaten to surface. Steve Rogers doesn’t cry; men don’t cry; Steve doesn’t mind it when Bucky cries. “You don’t.”

“But I do.”

“No!” Steve explodes. “You don’t want this! Stop trying to push me away! I won’t let you. I’m here to stay. You’ve told me how you feel alone, how you keep pushing people away and I won’t let you do it to me. I’m going to help you by staying and I don’t care what you think about that right now.”

“How fucking dare you! Don’t I deserve the right to my own choices?”

“Not when they’re stupid.”

“You’re being a stubborn asshole!”

“You’re being stupid!”

“I’m not! I’m being _reasonable_.”

Steve glares, strides up to Bucky and looms over him like a castle on top of a hill looking down at a measly peasant. “You’re lying to yourself,” he hisses.

“No, I’m being honest. This isn’t going to work Steve.” The force just isn’t there, the words come out weak and jumbled like Bucky’s already taken it back but doesn’t have the heart to overcome his pride and admit defeat. “It is. Look, we’re arguing now but we’re going to overcome this too. Because I’m staying. What’s the point if I leave now? What will either of us have accomplished? I’m still in the middle of learning about society and I’m not willing to turn my back on that. I’m still in the middle of helping you through this…illness in your mind. I’m still in the middle of making one of the best friends of my entire life. You’re pretty much my _first_ friend, Buck, don’t take that away from me.” Bucky completely breaks at that and his entire resolve crumbles to dust. Tears flood and without even realising his jelly legs have moved, he bundles himself up in Steve’s arms, choking out “I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’m so fucking sorry. I didn’t mean it. I didn’t. I just-“

“Sssh,” Steve coaxes calmly, resting his hand around the back of Bucky’s head, stroking soothingly. “It’s alright. I forgive you.”

“I don’t deserve that,” Bucky says through a sob.

“Yes, you do. This illness in your mind, it’s tricking you. You deserve forgiveness.” Bucky pushes away the shudder of discomfort at the word ‘illness’ for describing his mental health. He doesn’t think you’re supposed to anymore and it’s so ingrained in him that he can’t overcome the discomfort. But the more he thinks about it, the nicer the word seems. Illness makes it sound curable, makes the goal of overcoming it attainable. Of course he knows, deep down, that things like this never truly leave you but for now, for now he can pretend.

“Okay,” he whispers mutely, clutching Steve harder than before.

“It’s going to be okay, Buck,” Steve reassures, taking a calm breath and giving himself a let down from the pumping adrenaline and fear. “It’s going to be okay.”

 

 

A few days pass before Bucky’s truly back to his usual self. The embarrassment and sadness crowding his mind take him over until Steve drags him outside. They’re perusing the fruit aisle in the local supermarket when Bucky excuses himself - Steve’s not listening why, he’s too focused on the absolutely maddening variety of fruit there is in front of him, he hasn’t even _heard_ of some of this shit - leaving Steve alone in an aisle full of unknowns and absolutely no way of knowing what Bucky might want. Plums? Bucky likes plums; Steve knows what plums are. He reaches forward to see that it’s not the only batch of plums in the aisle. There’s unpackaged plums, packaged plums and variations of each - Steve didn’t even know that plums could be different colours. Green? Green?! He fumbles, his hand going over the selection like he’s looking for something in the dark. “Hey, man, you alright?” Steve jumps and turns to see a man with an all-teeth smile, a tiny gap between the middle two, looking at him like he’s lost his shit but with enough empathy that Steve might not just deck this guy in the face: he doesn’t like bullies.

“Yeah, fine,” he huffs.

“You don’t sound fine,” the guy tries, pushing past the boundaries of polite grocery shopping etiquette. When he’s met with silence, he adds “get the fresh ones. The normal looking ones. They’re the best.” Steve turns, unable to hide the gratefulness in his expression as he reaches for the plums and puts them in a small plastic - when had they stopped using paper? - bag before dropping them into the basket. “Uh, thanks…”

“Sam. Sam Wilson.”

Steve smiles. “Steve Rogers, nice to meet you.”

“Well, in dire circumstances-“

“They weren’t dire,” Steve groans, unable to stop the breaching smile on his face.

“Oh it was. You should have seen your face. What kinda guy can’t choose what plums to get?”

“And what kinda guy decides to start a conversation in a grocery store?”

“Is that how this is?”

“Oh, it is.” Both of them burst out laughing just as Bucky returns, looking mystified and a little bristling - jealousy’s a bitch. “Hey, Buck,” Steve wheezes between laughs. “This is Sam Wilson.” Bucky gives Steve a questioning glance when Sam’s not looking, which Steve easily ignores, before holding out his hand and introducing himself. “James Barnes. Or Bucky, that’s what most people call me.”

“Sounds old-fashioned.”

“Well at least it’s not boring, _Sam_.” At one glance, Steve knew a rivalry had begun. He smiled.

 

 

Steve, after running into Sam when picking up coffee for Buck on another ‘bad day’ as they’d coined them, had gotten the man’s phone number and now they kept in touch regularly (on Bucky’s phone through _WhatsApp_ because Steve knows Bucky doesn’t bother to look at it, even when the occasional message comes through), mostly now to ask how Steve was doing. Sam was intuitive, incredibly so, and could tell almost immediately that Steve was Bucky’s caretaker in a way - in the loosest sense of the word. Although, Steve was only glad he didn’t have the intuition to guess Steve’s other secret. Not that taking care of Bucky was a secret. Well, it kinda was. He’s going on the assumption that Bucky doesn’t want him advertising it. So that’s fine. Steve’s fine with that.

No, he is.

Really, he is.

Seriously, stop it, he is.

Whilst Sam is busy checking up on Steve, Steve manages to finagle bits of information about Sam. Firstly, and most importantly, he’s a man who’s a sucker for charity, in any form. Not only does he work down at the VA during his holidays (he’s studying psychology at University, doing a PhD), he also has started his own personal club (which by now has just become a group of his friends) of international students, predominantly American ones who were struggling to acclimatise to the UK. Secondly, Sam is an incredibly hard-worker. Not only does he work down at the VA, he also runs two student clubs, rallies when he can is an active activist around the UK. Steve has never been more in awe of a person. It’s like something finally clicks inside him too. Where he had stood up for the weak, even being weak himself, now there was people chanting in the streets for what was right. Not that that didn’t happen back in the day. It happened, a _lot_ , but after a bit of googling and seeing some of the support and numbers these events got almost broke Steve into tears.

Of course, it didn’t, Steve doesn’t cry.

But, Steve focuses on the first one for now. Bucky’s back in a good mood, awkwardly dancing around his room in his pyjamas as the Stone Roses plays on the vinyl player. As soon as Steve walks in, groceries in hand (he’s started doing it now just to help out) dropping them on the side for Bucky to put in the right place, Bucky stops, face beet red. “No, no, don’t stop for me.” Bucky glares playfully at him but turns down the music and rifles through the bags. “What’s this?” He asks, holding up a red and green flowery thing. “A dragonfruit,” Steve replies, smiling. “It just looked so interesting so I thought I might try it.”

“Buying yourself things with my money,” Bucky gasps, reeling back jokingly. “How dare you.”

Steve laughs. “What do you want? The only job I can get without papers is a criminal.”

“Oh you’d be a fabulous criminal. Taking them down one at a time for every little thing they do wrong. Become a vigilante! Perfect. You even have the superpowers for it. Oh, a real life superhero, I love it.” Bucky’s lost to the dream world whilst Steve chuckles and goes to sit on the bed, stretching backwards and clicking his back. “Ew,” Bucky complains but it’s become such a normal routine now that Steve only does it again and nothing else is said.

“So you know Sam?” Steve starts, looking at Bucky upside down, his head hanging off the other side of the bed.

“Yeah,” Bucky replies cautiously.

“Well I was talking with him-“

“Wait, when did you meet him?”

“When I was getting you coffee. He gave me his phone number.”

“But you don’t have a phone.”

“I know,” Steve replies mischievously.

“What have you-“

“Doesn’t matter! Anyway, so I was talking with Sam and he said that he is part of a group of _international students_ , mostly American, and he was wondering if we’d like to meet them?”

“Steve, that’s nice and all, but-“

“No buts! We’re going.”

“Do we have to?” Steve doesn’t even hide his smile (not only is excited for Bucky, he has an odd love for when Bucky defies him. He doesn’t do it to enough people, Steve thinks it’s good for him).

“Yup. It’ll be relaxed, I promise. Nothing more.”

“Okay,” Bucky sighs. And that was that.

 

 

For what Bucky would claim to be the first time, Steve was right. They enter a seamless looking room, bustled in by a busy looking Sam who’s somewhere between chatting to everyone and getting drinks out - only a few, which seem to be consumed in their entirety by one man - and placing a few snack bowls out. Bucky fumbles his way through the room, feeling the pumping of his heart as he stares around at a few strangers, almost immediately leaning to grab a beer. “Hey,” Steve interrupts, clasping Bucky’s arm in his hand, “maybe wait until later?” It wasn’t an outright no, and was definitely more of a suggestion than anything else and Bucky concedes without outright exploding, which is a feat in itself. Steve Rogers isn’t the boss of him, he doesn’t get to make decisions for him. But, he has to admit, Steve is probably right on this occasion. Today really is a good day for Steve’s judgement, Bucky admits grudgingly.

Bucky sits down on the empty sofa, Steve next to him, looking far more comfortable than his last outing, probably due to his much more modern perspective on things - Sunday tests are still an important thing for Steve and he’s really starting to act like a normal, modern human. He’s not sure whether he’s supposed to introduce himself so he reduces himself to silence, staring out at the small crowd who all look like they’re about to say something but think better of it.

Sam’s bustling back in, salsa in hand, when he jumps, startled by his mind and goes “shit, man. Guys!” He calls out, “this is Bucky and Steve. Brooklynites.” A man with very specific, and frankly over the top, facial hair is the first to storm up to them. “Hey! I’m Tony, New Yorker too.”

“Let me guess,” Bucky says immediately, “Tony Stark?”

“Ooh! My reputation precedes me.”

“Steve and I went to your house party. It was…interesting.”

“Glad you thought so,” Tony rambles, ignoring the backhanded compliment, “I always wanted to see what the fuss was with the eighties.” Before Tony can fall into a ramble about an era none of them have much care for, another girl steps forward, red hair perfectly straight falling down to her shoulders, and holds out a perfectly manicured hand to Steve. “It’s nice to meet you,” she says as he shakes it, looking a little scared, as she turns to Bucky and smiles “it really is a small world, James.”

“Natalia?!”

“It’s Natasha now.”

“Oh.” Steve sends Bucky a questioning look and he’s quick to follow up on it. “Natalia- Natasha was at my school for a while back in Brooklyn. Only a semester or something-“

“Two.”

“Yeah, two, but she made an…impact.” If the smile on Natasha’s face says anything, it’s that she definitely made more than an impact.

“I moved around a lot. From Russia to France to America to Germany and then here. I liked to make an _impact_ on the places I visited.”

“You…you punched a guys teeth out.”

“And did he deserve it?”

“Of course.”

“Then I don’t see what the problem is,” she says flippantly and smiles with shark-like teeth. Trying to save them from another disaster, a wreck of a man steps forward and goes “I’m Clint.” At the chorus of “I don’t care” that comes from all but one of the other people in the room, Steve and Bucky stare incredulously at the crowd; maybe this wasn’t such a good idea? “Ignore them. It’s a joke.”

“Not a funny one,” a man, who later introduces himself as T’Challa, pipes up from the back of the room with a slight African accent.

“It’s…nice to meet you, Clint,” Steve says, ever smiling whilst Bucky gives an awkward wave and waits for the rest of them to just go through their names before an awkward silence settles on the group. “I’m Thor,” a man booms from next to Steve, “and this is my brother Loki. We are Norwegian.” Steve can’t hold the smile of his face as this man, Thor, smiles down at him like he’s never been happier in his life. Bucky can’t help but stare at his brother Loki, though, who looks like he might just choke his brother in his sleep if he got the chance. “Adopted.” Loki adds. “I’m his adoptive brother.”

“Oh stop saying that, brother, it does not matter.” The disdainful look Loki sends his brother says that it very much _does_ matter. “Daddy issues,” someone mumbles mischievously, though Bucky can’t pinpoint who. Loki doesn’t seem to bothered by the comment.

“I’m Viz, short for vision. I’m not sure why my parents called me that but they did. And yes, I’m an international student. I came from Kenya, I was just born in Britain,” the man recited, listing the answers to every question that was on the tip of Bucky’s tongue.

“Well, my parents named me James Buchanan so I understand the pain.”

Viz chuckled. “I have to admit, it was a poor choice on their part,” he says honestly; Bucky doesn’t care.

“It certainly was.”

“Wanda,” a girl introduces herself in a much thicker Russian accent than Natasha has (though by now, Natasha’s accent is almost entirely American), black makeup smudged around her eyes and tangled brown hair falling to her chest. “Maximoff,” she adds as an afterthought.

“I’m Bruce,” an older man says, stepping forward.

“Nice to meet you, Bruce,” Bucky says, gaining confidence in himself as Steve lets him take the lead, glad that he has at least said hello to everyone here (except T’Challa but the man looms darkly at the edge of the room and Bucky doesn’t have the courage to go up to him), even if he can’t remember a few of their names.

Steve quickly extricates himself from the sofa and makes his way to T’Challa and within an instant, they are in the depth of an intellectual conversation; Bucky can see Steve cling onto every word with the knowledge that he can now remember this all - where he had once struggled at learning, he now excelled at.

Bucky goes to the easiest option available, Natasha, who is quick to let him join her conversation with Bruce before the conversation shifts and she asks Bucky, “so, what are you studying?”

“Oh…sports studies,” he sighs, sounding even less pleased than usual when he mentions his degree.

“Oh, and you like it?”

“Sure,” Bucky says unconvincingly, “it’s great.” Natasha gives him a withering stare but lets him go, they were never really that close after all, they are still strangers for the most part, apart for a brief spiel that neither of them probably want to talk about (Bucky hadn’t come out, Natasha was new and it was all very, _very_ complicated) that lasted less than a week. “I’m doing political science, I’m thinking I might go into International Relations. People are saying my knowledge of languages might give me a boost in my career.” Although she says ‘might’, it sounds to Bucky like she knows that that’s exactly what’s going to happen. God, he wishes he could think like that. He looks at Steve from the corner of his eye, examining the way his body moves when he’s invested in a conversation, and chastises himself. Steve wouldn’t let him think like that so he shouldn’t. “Fuck,” Bucky thinks, eyes looking to the ceiling like he wants an answer, just at the moment Natasha turns to Bruce, “Steve, why do you have to be in my head like this?” At that very moment, Steve turns around, looking a little scared and a lot shaken. Bucky looks at him questioningly and Steve just points to his head, then Bucky’s mouth and back and forth until Bucky goes “can you hear me?” Not aloud of course, that would go against the entire test. Steve seems to hear him like they’re standing side by side, nodding furiously. “This is new,” Bucky thinks, aiming it at Steve in the best way he can think to, “add this to the list. Are you able to do it back?” Steve shakes his head. “Oh…well. You can’t hear all my thoughts, can you?” Steve shakes his head. Bucky lets out a sigh. “Good. I’ll come over in a sec.” Steve smiles and nods and turns back to his conversation with T’Challa as Bucky turns back to Natasha and Bruce and reintegrates himself into the conversation that they left him out of when he’d turned around.

The night dwindles slowly and people begin to leave. By that time, Bucky has made solid friends (and a few enemies, although he’s sure - or at least pretty sure - it’s a joke). Natasha and he seemed to click into place in a way he wouldn’t have expected before whilst Sam and he made the best of their mutual friend Steve and fought like they were in the doghouse. Tony and Bucky avoided each other like the plague but spat out brilliant one liners whenever together. Wanda and Bucky immediately clicked, for no apparent reason but chemistry, and Bucky even made an attempt at a friendship with Loki which ended out a lot better than he expected (not great but he didn’t get killed which is the main point). Steve, unexpected to him but so entirely expected by Bucky, made quick friends with everyone. He was still on more polite terms than friendship with some of them but every conversation he was in, he seemed to click into it like it was second nature.

Bucky wonders now if Steve lied about having no friends before, he just can’t imagine it. Steve does seem at least vaguely uncomfortable with the fact that he gets so much attention nowadays but in the way that a healthy person does, he deals with it and lets himself feel accomplished. Bucky, for once in his life, lets himself feel it too.

“So,” Steve begins on their way home, “you like them?”

Bucky nods reluctantly. “Yeah, I like them.” Steve smiles like he knows he’s found a solution (and maybe he has).


End file.
